“Give this word to be heard” in the present: after the success in the bookstore, “Le Allowance” by Vanessa Springora, which tells of the relationship under the influence of the publisher, then a teenager, with the writer Gabriel Matzneff, lands on the tables at Toulon, with Ludivine Sagnier in the title role.
“So is it all true? Aren’t they … a fiction?”: Behind a translucent veil in the background you can glimpse a blurred nude silhouette. The frozen actress, with a distorted voice, recalls the anxiety attacks and psychotic episodes that followed her relationship with the famous writer, 30 years older than her, who left an indelible “imprint” in her life. .
With terror and helplessness, the spectators of the room of the Théâtre Châteauvallon-Liberté – deliberately chosen to preserve an intimate relationship with the public – gradually see the trap of the sexual predator “with a carnivorous smile” closing on its prey, a teenager in the resigned father who desperately wants to be loved.
The actress Ludivine Sagnier on stage on October 3, 2022 in “Le Consentiment”, in Toulon / AFP
Pink tank top, gray jogging, white sneakers and ponytail, Ludivine Sagnier, 43, embodies a young girl full of candor, at 13 she meets Gabriel Matzneff for the first time, who, at almost 50, will become her mistress.
From time to time, she also plays with a jarring irony – one that today’s adult brings to an overly complacent entourage in the mid-1980s – Vanessa Springora’s mother or even various doctors she is taken to consult.
“It is a fair balance to be found between what is a story, a statement of facts and the reflection that surrounds these facts” more than thirty years later, director Sébastien Davis told AFP, before the first in France to took place on Monday in Toulon. With “Le Consentiment”, she is the third soloist of him, “curiously every time with women”.
– “True artistic act” –
Actress Ludivine Sagnier poses after performing “Le Consentiment” on October 3, 2022 in Toulon / AFP
“The story is quite fragmented and even within the fragments there are moments in the present, comments, returns to the past, that is, many pauses to operate and a rhythm to master, but it is very gratifying to be able to take up such a challenge”, underlined Ludivine Sagnier, for the first time alone on stage.
“I have the impression that it is a fairly complete way of investing myself because it is not just about brandishing concepts on the networks to justify an implication,” added the actress.
“Only one place allows two to stay in this room, the bed”: soon, the rhythm of the percussion played live accelerates, the light becomes more subdued, the actress lingers for a long time on the bed at the black silk sheets before to yield, in a state of tetania, to the anticipations of the 1950s.
Actress Ludivine Sagnier on stage on October 3, 2022 in Toulon / AFP
“Ludivine Sagnier and Pierre Belleville, the drummer, dialogue for me, the music (composed by Dan Lévy, of The Do group, ed) sometimes comes to illustrate, sometimes it acts as a counterpoint to the action and this allows our mind to calm down and move on in action, “Sébastien Davis pointed out.
The garden side bed is matched by a courtyard side desk, embodying the writer’s fascination with adolescents, who will make writing one of his most formidable weapons of influence before falling into his own trap. .
“When Vanessa Springora published her book (in 2020), all the media focused on the news, but there is a real language, there is a style”, noted the director, specifying that the author was “completely trusted” him in adapting the text.
Actress Ludivine Sagnier, musician Pierre Belleville (L) and director Sébastien Davis (R) on October 3, 2022 in Toulon / AFP
“Bringing + Consensus + on stage is making this word heard, whether it is received in a shocking, overwhelming way, in the present”, he continued, seeing in this text a “true artistic act” with profound resonances on mentalities.
“I will not change society through theatrical staging”, he admitted, before adding: “The theater is there as a mirror of who we are”.
