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Caroline Loeb: "Françoise Sagan's reflections are extraordinarily current"

2022-11-19T06:12:59.570Z


In a mesmerizing show, the actress brings the author of Bonjour Tristesse back to life. The lights go out. A woman alone on stage, blond, her body curled up, smokes. The spark of his cigarette tears the black space. “I wore my legend like a veil. This delicious mask, a little primitive, corresponded to my obvious tastes: speed, the sea, midnight, everything that is dazzling, everything that is black, everything that loses, and therefore allows you to find yourself. It is Françoise Sa


The lights go out.

A woman alone on stage, blond, her body curled up, smokes.

The spark of his cigarette tears the black space.

“I wore my legend like a veil.

This delicious mask, a little primitive, corresponded to my obvious tastes: speed, the sea, midnight, everything that is dazzling, everything that is black, everything that loses, and therefore allows you to find yourself.

It

is Françoise Sagan resuscitated.

Or rather Caroline Loeb who, as a miracle worker, brings the author of

Bonjour Tristesse

back to life , in

Françoise by Sagan

, an intoxicating play, directed by Alex Lutz, with the collaboration of Sophie Barjac.

The author, actress, director and singer confides in her “fusional encounter” with the writer.

To discover

  • Theatre: what are the best plays to see in Paris in 2022?

Read alsoFrançoise Sagan, shadow and light on two theater stages

LE FIGARO.

- You previously created a show on George Sand.

Why did you choose Françoise Sagan this time?

Caroline LOEB.

-

I would rather say that it was Sagan who chose me!

In fact I arrived in Sagan thanks to George Sand and Alex Lutz.

In the show on Sand, already staged by him, at one point I said that she was the Madonna, the Sagan of the time since she was a star at the heart of the debates and polemics of her time.

It was at Lutz that I discovered Je ne nenie rien, a collection of interviews published by Stock, and when it was offered to me a few months later, I fell in love with these words. of Sagan.

I knew right away that I could make a monologue out of it.

What struck me first was the gulf between what I knew of her, her reputation as a night-clubber, a player, a somewhat frivolous and worldly image, and the depth of her thought.

Its lightness is only apparent.

It is the sign of his great modesty.

I don't find her disillusioned but lucid and sometimes fierce.

She speaks extremely well of notoriety: “I put on the mask of my legend, and it stopped bothering me.

Obviously, that resonated strongly with me.

Notoriety often (always?) creates a gap between the person we really are and the image people have of us.

I've been facing this hiatus for quite a long time with this tube that keeps chasing me and tends to take up all the space in the eyes of others.

In a way, like

and she stopped bothering me.

Obviously, that resonated strongly with me.

Notoriety often (always?) creates a gap between the person we really are and the image people have of us.

I've been facing this hiatus for quite a long time with this tube that keeps chasing me and tends to take up all the space in the eyes of others.

In a way, like

and she stopped bothering me.

Obviously, that resonated strongly with me.

Notoriety often (always?) creates a gap between the person we really are and the image people have of us.

I've been facing this hiatus for quite a long time with this tube that keeps chasing me and tends to take up all the space in the eyes of others.

In a way, like

Hello sadness

, it's a success that we try to survive, artistically.

And then I was overwhelmed by his lucidity, his subtle humor, the air of not touching it.

I identified very strongly with his words, even though I am quite different from Sagan.

When the lights go out, the atmosphere becomes dark and you appear almost in chiaroscuro.

A way to get us into Sagan's head?

Yes, the show could have been called “Inside Françoise Sagan”, it's an inner journey.

With Alex Luz, and Anne Coudret who created the lights, we wanted this intimacy, that it wasn't me we saw, but her, and the public often tell me that they spent an hour with Sagan.

Of course, there are a lot of things that bind me to her.

First his unconditional and absolute love for literature.

Like her, I have the feeling of having built myself with my books.

Obviously we share the love of the night and its sleepless nights, the passion for people who have spirit.

She spent her time with Jacques Chazot and Bernard Franck, renowned for their intelligence and humor.

Like her, I've always liked witty people, I could kill father and mother for a good word, and I

Have you become Sagan?

I would rather say that she moves in with me during the show.

What's pretty crazy is this feeling that it's both one hundred percent her and one hundred percent me.

A real fusional encounter.

And it's also the actor's paradox, this feeling of being completely naked by playing someone other than me.

The show is based on the interviews she gave in her time.

What do her answers say about her, about the time?

What would she think of our world?

What struck me was how extraordinarily topical many of his reflections are.

What she says about sexuality: “We talk too much about sexuality today.

Sexuality, eroticism cannot be exhibited”.

On injunctions to happiness: “All those stupid slogans in the newspapers: 'be happy'… Finally, it's abominable!

We explain to them how shameful and stupid it is to be unhappy because everything is done to be happy.

So when they're not, they feel guilty.

Before, we were unhappy.

Now, if you don't walk around saying, "It's alright, it's alright," you say, "You poor moron, go see a psychiatrist or take such-and-such a pill."

It's still stupid.

On time: "Society steals people's time."

Every time I say this sentence on stage I think of the crazy time we spend on social networks!

All of these questions, and many more, are terribly topical.

I think she would have hated this obscenity of continuous information, of buzz, like a hard drug.

That she would have hated Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

In the 60's, 70's and 80's the information was still less vulgar and you could preserve your privacy more.

I think that the great vulgarity of our time would have been unbearable to him.

she would have hated Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

In the 60's, 70's and 80's the information was still less vulgar and you could preserve your privacy more.

I think that the great vulgarity of our time would have been unbearable to him.

she would have hated Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

In the 60's, 70's and 80's the information was still less vulgar and you could preserve your privacy more.

I think that the great vulgarity of our time would have been unbearable to him.


In your show, you sport a blonde wig, a shirt, and simple pants for any costume.

How do you work to become Sagan?

Have you been afraid to betray her at times?

The work immediately had a self-evident character.

Alex Lutz had the vision for the show, the blonde wig, the trouser silhouette… It wasn't difficult.

The only question was "Will the public believe it?"

And the answer was immediately yes.

And then Alex Lutz gave me some indications: place my voice in the treble, curl up my body a little and embody his nervousness, his anxiety.

It immediately made her exist.

And I don't have a lot of trouble being anxious!

(laughs) I wasn't afraid to betray her since I felt a kind of twinship with her.

But it is true that the bet was risky.

It's very rare to find a character, a text that allows you to say such intimate and essential things about yourself.

And then me

to see that this thought touched the public so much and took on a universal character was the greatest gift.

I worked on feeling each phrase I had chosen, intimately.

Connect to how these phrases resonated with me.

I found her on the inside, not on the outside.

It was by trying to be the most sincere that I believe that I came to a form of communion with her.

Sagan had a sense of pirouette and good words but also a disarming sincerity.

It is this ability to assume all its paradoxes and all its contradictions that also make it so touching and endearing.

But I didn't start reading his novels until well after the performances had started.

For me, all of Sagan was in the interviews.

it was the most beautiful gift.

I worked on feeling each phrase I had chosen, intimately.

Connect to how these phrases resonated with me.

I found her on the inside, not on the outside.

It was by trying to be the most sincere that I believe that I came to a form of communion with her.

Sagan had a sense of pirouette and good words but also a disarming sincerity.

It is this ability to assume all its paradoxes and all its contradictions that also make it so touching and endearing.

But I didn't start reading his novels until well after the performances had started.

For me, all of Sagan was in the interviews.

it was the most beautiful gift.

I worked on feeling each phrase I had chosen, intimately.

Connect to how these phrases resonated with me.

I found her on the inside, not on the outside.

It was by trying to be the most sincere that I believe that I came to a form of communion with her.

Sagan had a sense of pirouette and good words but also a disarming sincerity.

It is this ability to assume all its paradoxes and all its contradictions that also make it so touching and endearing.

But I didn't start reading his novels until well after the performances had started.

For me, all of Sagan was in the interviews.

Connect to how these phrases resonated with me.

I found her on the inside, not on the outside.

It was by trying to be the most sincere that I believe that I came to a form of communion with her.

Sagan had a sense of pirouette and good words but also a disarming sincerity.

It is this ability to assume all its paradoxes and all its contradictions that also make it so touching and endearing.

But I didn't start reading his novels until well after the performances had started.

For me, all of Sagan was in the interviews.

Connect to how these phrases resonated with me.

I found her on the inside, not on the outside.

It was by trying to be the most sincere that I believe that I came to a form of communion with her.

Sagan had a sense of pirouette and good words but also a disarming sincerity.

It is this ability to assume all its paradoxes and all its contradictions that also make it so touching and endearing.

But I didn't start reading his novels until well after the performances had started.

For me, all of Sagan was in the interviews.

Sagan had a sense of pirouette and good words but also a disarming sincerity.

It is this ability to assume all its paradoxes and all its contradictions that also make it so touching and endearing.

But I didn't start reading his novels until well after the performances had started.

For me, all of Sagan was in the interviews.

Sagan had a sense of pirouette and good words but also a disarming sincerity.

It is this ability to assume all its paradoxes and all its contradictions that also make it so touching and endearing.

But I didn't start reading his novels until well after the performances had started.

For me, all of Sagan was in the interviews.

Who was she after all?

I would say a philosopher.

That's what upset me the most.

Like a wise old man in a young girl's body.

And at the same time totally unique, which is fascinating.

As often I discover that the artists who dare the most to reveal themselves in their specificity, if they are absolutely sincere, manage to touch the universal.

What remains of Françoise Sagan today?

Her work of course, but also her life as a free woman.

I have always been fascinated by women who invented a unique place for themselves in the world: Josephine Baker, Marlene Dietrich, Dorothy Parker, Arletty, Mae West… Like them, Sagan embodies freedom.

And that always does a lot of good.

Caroline Loeb in

Françoise par Sagan

, Every Saturday and Sunday at 6 p.m. at La Divine Comédie.

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Source: lefigaro

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