Philippe Adrien, a figure of contemporary theater who had directed Molière, Tchekhov and African authors and worked with disabled actors, died Wednesday, September 15 at the age of 81, the Théâtre de la Tempête told AFP. , which he directed for a long time.
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The Théâtre de la Tempête team learned with sadness of the death of Philippe Adrien (December 19, 1939 - September 15, 2021), a director who was welcomed from 1985 into permanent residence at the Théâtre de la Tempête, before see entrusting the management of this emblematic place of the Cartoucherie between 1996 and 2016
”, according to a press release from the theater located in the Bois de Vincennes, in the east of the capital.
With its reference authors, Molière, Claudel and these last years Tchekhov, Philippe Adrien, successor of Antoine Vitez and faithful of Ariane Mnouchkine, liked to draw a portrait of humanity "
as close to the dustbins as to eternity
".
By choosing great authors like Brecht, Beckett or Claudel, he reveals his taste for dramatic poetry with strong philosophical, religious or political accents.
But he is also interested in contemporary authors like Copi, Armando Llamas, Hervé Guibert or Enzo Cormann.
Relations with Africa and Comédie Française
His relations with Africa led Philippe Adrien to go up to the Théâtre de la Colline
Kinkali
by Arnaud Bédouet, which in 1997 received the Molière for best creative show.
He tackles the question of colonization with
Mélédouman
by Philippe Auger, then
The Conrad Project
, an adaptation of the short story
An Outpost of Progress
and, in 2014,
Boesman and Lena
by South African author Athol Fugard.
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In the early 2000s, he worked with Bruno Netter, a blind actor, and the Compagnie du Troisième Œil, made up of disabled and able-bodied actors, a collaboration that gave an unprecedented resonance to works such as
Le Malade imaginaire
by Molière in 2001 and then
Le Trial
of Kafka,
Oedipus king
by Sophocles,
Don Quixote
by Cervantes and
Les Chaises
de Ionesco. Professor at the National Conservatory of Dramatic Art between 1989 and 2003, Philippe Adrien also directed at the Comédie Française.