At 68, after giving Quebec drama some of his most singular plays, some of his most daring works on a formal level, Larry Tremblay is finally making his debut at the Théâtre du Nouveau Monde. Directed by Catherine Vidal, fifteen years after it was created by Claude Poissant under the banner of Théâtre PÀP, Abraham Lincoln goes to the theater is a vertiginous piece, a terrible and nevertheless breathtaking plunge into the spectacular paradoxes of America.
Why on April 14, 1865, during a performance of the play Our American Cousin at Ford’s Theater in Washington, did comedian John Wilkes Booth assassinate President Abraham Lincoln? To find an answer to this question which torments him, of course by using the means of the theatre, the director Marc Killman (Bruno Marcil), our contemporary, calls on two actors, Léonard (Mani Soleymanlou) and Christian (Luc Bourgeois ). When Killman dies in the middle of rehearsal, it is Sébastien Johnson (Didier Lucien) who is hired to complete the project. Note that at the very moment when Lincoln was invited to the TNM stage, Edmond Rostand was evoked at the Green Curtain and Louis II, King of Bavaria, at the Denise-Pelletier theatre. Three Quebec plays on display at the same time use historical figures to shed light on the present.
Identity issues
After The Dragonfly of Chicoutimi And the ventriloquistLarry Tremblay offered with Abraham Lincoln goes to the theater which is still today the most ingenious of his quests for identity, a necklace of wacky and disturbing mise en abyme, a space where the truths, all of a sudden momentary, fit together as impeccably as Russian dolls. It is a convoluted story, but where nothing is left to chance; an adventure full of twists and turns, but where comedy and tragedy never leave each other; a cascade of revelations, but where the mask always falls to reveal… another mask. We recognize all the same that, in the last third of this show of almost two hours, the device, as mastered as it is, becomes a bit boring.
Among the many alter egos who invite themselves into the rehearsal room, we must mention Laurel and Hardy, the famous comic duo active from 1927 to 1955. To Christian, the actor, Marc, the director, says: “I want you to play Stan Laurel playing John Wilkes Booth about to assassinate the statue of Abraham Lincoln. This gives an idea of the way in which identities constantly fit together in this game of massacre that Catherine Vidal has chosen to set in a sober environment, a partially clouded mirror with larks, a space with deceptive reflections thanks to which Geneviève Lizotte (scenography) and Étienne Boucher (lighting) skilfully accentuate the duplication of beings.
To marry the burlesque nature of the work, the director used video projections which we will be content to say that they arouse rather fatty laughter. While the interpretations of Bruno Marcil and Dider Lucien offer little reason to rejoice, those of Mani Soleymanlou and Luc Bourgeois are irresistible in their rigor and complicity. To the precision of the language, to the clarity of the message, to the truculence of the compositions, never pouring into histrionics, is grafted the rich body language with which the characters are endowed. We clearly recognize the unique touch of choreographer Mélanie Demers in the setting in motion. After Chapters of the fall And At the top of the mountainthis show allows Catherine Vidal to continue her reflection on the other side of the American dream, a cycle to which we strongly hope that other parts will be added.