“Don't be hesitant
,” Muriel Mayette-Holtz said to a young girl with long blond hair.
Sitting on the stage, her knees in the air and her hands on her ankles, the actress searches for her words, her eyes staring into space, tries again to describe "the trap" that she is supposed to embody and of which she has drawn. the title a few seconds ago.
Another failure.
“You are losing us.
You only focus on yourself, ”
explains his teacher benevolently.
Estelle is not a professional.
It is even the first time that she has performed a scene of this stature
.
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Winner of the Motor project !, competition created by the association of the same name, the 16-year-old Béthunoise was selected with twenty-four other young people, aged 14 to 22, to participate in the “Confidence Campus”, one week of artistic training organized by the collective. From November 1 to 7, from the Commune Image studios in Saint-Ouen to the boards of the National Theater in Nice (TNN), the entire promotion is initiated into the oratory arts, Slam, or even the theater. All punctuated by visits, screenings and meetings with filmmakers and actors. To participate in the adventure, the winners each sent a video, a portrait of about one minute and thirty seconds, of a person they admire. This year, the jury, chaired by director Maïmouna Doucouré, viewed more than 400 short films.
"Motor!
on stage"
The themes are varied, sometimes personal, sometimes symbolic.
Estelle chose the Little Prince,
"a character who represents values specific to children," she
explains, this time surrounded by her friends on Castel beach.
16-year-old Arthur chose to work on his college teacher, Madame Arnal.
Obliged to follow the courses of a unit localized for the educational inclusion (ULIS) - course dedicated to the pupils whose handicap does not allow to consider a schooling known as "normal" - of the college Molière, in Paris, the teenager tells how the teacher gave him the help and attention he needed to build himself.
"She was moved and impressed"
when she discovered the portrait, tells the student who is now preparing a professional baccalaureate in photography.
The competition has been around for five years, but 2021 marks the first collaboration with TNN.
During a dinner with the actor and sponsor of the Samuel Le Bihan project, Caroline Sénéclauze, founder and president of Motor !, meets Muriel Mayette-Holtz, at the head of the national scene since 2019. Between the two women, the link is formed naturally.
A few words about the initiative are enough to excite the actress, who is keen for the future promotion to set up the stage for her theater, thus extending the campus program planned for November by three days.
The new initiative is called “Engine!
en scene ”and the former director of the Comédie Française mobilizes her address book, imagines workshops, invites Coline Serreau to meet young people.
The latter, after attending the screening of 25 short films, gives them some well-felt advice and recounts her personal experience, all punctuated with anecdotes from the shootings.
Everyone has their question, their remark.
Silences are rare.
Most of the small audience have never seen
Three Men and a Bassinet
.
It doesn't matter.
All are measuring their luck.
Read alsoColine Serreau: "You have to think beyond yourself"
The first contact between Muriel Mayette-Holtz and the apprentice filmmakers was made while the director of TNN was accompanying them on the trip to the campus: a trip to Cannes in July, where each of the laureates was awarded a clap d 'gold by the delegate general Thierry Frémaux, after having climbed the steps.
Alhusein Khraled, 21, has fond memories of it.
Our supervisors are the cocoon of our group.
They believe in us, we see the hope in their eyes.
Émilie, one of the 25 winners of the Motor Competition!
The young man fled Syria at the age of 11 and arrived in France four years later, having passed through Lebanon and Egypt. This story, he told it in his portrait. Today in culinary terminal in a vocational high school in Roubaix, he discovered the competition thanks to his culinary arts teacher. His climb up the stairs was a revelation. He now wants to be an actor, preferably in action films. But the November sessions, improvising alongside Muriel and Slam led by actor and director Jacky Ido, elated him. Above all, he says he is grateful for the team around him.
"Thanks to this trip, thanks to Caroline who gave me confidence"
, he was able
"to show the strength of the Syrians"
some of whom, like him, did not speak French when they arrived in the territory.
He is not the only one to be deeply touched by this consideration.
“Our supervisors are the cocoon of our group.
They believe in us, we see the hope in their eyes, ”
describes Émilie, 21, who has just obtained her baccalaureate as a free candidate and is preparing to take the theater conservatory competitions.
Léone, 17, agrees:
“Being here, thanks to them, thanks to Caroline… Everything Jacky has done for us… They come to see us individually, discuss with us and do not devalue us like other adults can. , boiling down to a lazy “phone generation”.
They push us like our parents could. ”
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Gain confidence, dare, break down barriers between generations. These objectives, Caroline Sénéclauze put them at the heart of the Motor! Experience. Also a member of the CSA Diversity Observatory, she considers these issues to be determinants of social success. This spirit of solidarity has pushed her to seek partnerships with non-Ile-de-France school academies. Her choice fell on Hauts-de-France, still affected by deindustrialisation and where the links between young people and culture have, according to her, weakened. Thus, each year, ten places out of the 25 allocated to participants of the Confidence Campus are reserved for young people from the region. This is the only quota put in place, while the 2021 class stands out for theoverwhelming majority of girls who compose it.
At the Nice National Theater on Saturday 6 November, Muriel Mayette-Holtz has planned to put the concept carried by Motor! On stage for good. It is also the occasion to end in beauty the adventures of the group, whose members will necessarily go back to Paris the next day, death in the soul, before being exploded in trains direction the six corners of the Hexagon. They avoid thinking about it for the moment and focus their attention on the three participants - who are not part of the promotion -, aged 11, 15 and 20, invited to get on the boards. In turn, the latter sit in the armchairs arranged on stage, each accompanied by a person they admire. Helped by the questions of the journalist Laura Tenoudji of Télématin, they sketch the portrait of their models,in front of an audience of friends and family. A first intimate, sometimes wobbly, but of a touching sincerity.
