For Sylvie Drapeau, “we all have a little Mademoiselle Agnès in us, but we are not proud of it”.
The character that the actress plays in the play of the same name by Rebekka Kricheldorf is an art critic who does not reserve her vitriolic judgments solely on the works she lists on her blog, she also subjects her radical pursuit of truth to his relatives, tracking down all their pretenses. It is a contemporary transposition of the Misanthrope by Moliere. A process which the German playwright is accustomed to, as we saw in Villa Dolorosastripper adaptation of Three sisters by Chekhov, staged in 2013 at Espace Go.
Louis-Karl Tremblay, who signs the Quebec adaptation and the staging of the show presented at Prospero, was seduced by the biting and corrosive humor of Kricheldorf. “I had the impression that she named very well the failings of our cultural milieu. For example the “hypocrisy”, in big quotation marks, which we show between us when we say: “Bravo, that’s really good.” We don’t really name things. What Agnès says are phrases that I would like to say sometimes, but that I would never want to hear about myself. It’s quite enjoyable. Although it may be going a bit too far. »
Sylvie Drapeau laughed a lot when she read this biting text, which she describes as “powerful and just”. But the interpreter of miss Agnès admits that she finds it difficult to carry the constant negativity of the one who professes her hatred of all humanity. “By dint of internalizing it, it’s a lot of energy to be always angry, contemptuous. Sometimes I lose my energy. And it does not evolve. It’s terrible because there is no way out. “Herself a good frankness in interviews, she admits having to learn to love her character. “We should not judge our characters and I am in a small bad trip right now [rires], but it is changing. »
If the director chose the great actress, it is, among other things, “precisely because Agnès is hyper-black, severe, and Sylvie is someone very human, who approaches all her characters with love, with light . I thought it gave a good contrast and depth to Agnès, so that she didn’t just become a caricature, a villain”.
Especially since we do not judge the role in the same way when it is feminized. “Of course we have a kind of bias against a woman who gets angry. If it was a man who was critical, we would find it funny. There, it’s more brittle, it seems. Because she’s a mother, too. And she treats her son, a musician, with the same ruthless frankness that she deploys with everyone (except her lover).
Is Agnès right in her demand for truth? “Nobody has the same point of view on that,” replies Sylvie Drapeau. I think she’s wrong. It’s easier to see the twig in someone else’s eye than the beam in yours. She hates herself. »
Louis-Karl Tremblay believes that, in the first part of the play, she is right to denounce the shortcomings of the other characters. “But at one point, things change and Agnès pursues her utopia of the ultimate truth. This is the fundamental question that the text poses: “Does it take a dose of lies to function” in society?
The misanthrope also confronts others with their contradictions, exposing the gap between their supposed values and their actions. A complicated match in today’s world. “Being able to meet the requirements of our ideals is really very difficult,” notes Louis-Karl Tremblay. Of course I am for the environment, but I have an iPhone which is extremely harmful to the environment, maybe I am wearing fast fashion… Is it possible to be completely in tune with our ideals with globalization? It is a utopia. »
The beautiful environment
The author has set her piece in her own world, culture. How does this satire of hypocrisy work well in the artistic world? Louis-Karl Tremblay laughs. “It’s terrible to say that. We don’t want to hurt people, because there’s a lot of work, value in what we do. To represent this story where the blogger “holds a living room at home”, he says he was inspired by Andy Warhol’s Silver Factory. “In terms of staging, there is something about performance. The characters offer a performance. »
Sylvie Drapeau, she does not think that lies are “worse in [son] environment “. What about those premieres where you have to go congratulate your comrades after a show you didn’t really appreciate? “If the interpreter of the play is not a relative, you go home. As Jean-Pierre Ronfard said when he left a show he didn’t like: “It didn’t happen.” I love that. But when it comes to a friend who knows you were in the room, you’re sure to go to the dressing rooms. And as you are an actress yourself and you haven’t always acted in masterpieces, you know that it’s as much work, as much devotion to go on stage in a play that works less well. Moreover. Those who read the reviews, especially, suffer a lot, and the following days, it is a despair to go on stage. Once, I did a show that really didn’t work — we don’t say a title! — and the only visit I had had was that of Andrée Lachapelle and André Melançon. They just hugged me, they didn’t even say a word. It meant: we love you, period. »
However, for Agnès, saying nothing is also a lie. “She would have liked them to say: ‘Sylvie, it’s shit, but we love you.’ [Rires.] Me, I prefer just love. Because you have to continue afterwards. Going on stage is already, phew! an act where you have to forget everything. We dive. It’s very difficult. »
And the protagonist of Miss Agnes was the first victim of his extreme requirement. At 25, she had published a successful novel, yet not good enough in her own eyes. “Years later, she wonders: Who was right? Me or the market? says the actress. But no one is right. It’s very subjective. I think there is sadness behind his ferocity. If she hadn’t been so self-critical, she would have made her living as an artist. We are not always good when we write. But we write! She says: “How to continue writing without upsetting the ghosts of Flaubert, Kleist, Miller, Barnes, Beckett, Camus, Dostoyevsky?” But can we just live if we’re awesome? »
Sylvie Drapeau knows the brake that too much self-criticism can constitute, she who has long “restrained” herself from taking up the pen. It would have taken a burnout at 48 so that the author — who has just published a fifth title,The bird game — launches into The river and its magnificent tetralogy. “That’s why I loved the play, too. I know exactly what she means. I didn’t dare to write either — besides, I interpreted the great authors. I understand her, Agnes. But sometimes I’m angry with her because she takes it out on others, and I have to stop that. I struggle with this dilemma as a performer. I must learn to love him. »
That is to say how memorable this meeting between actress and character promises to be…