Transmission and identity, truth and lies, the mystery of origins. The room Thousand asks big questions about the family and the legacy we want to leave. By recounting the fruits of her personal investigation, Monique Spaziani tries to pick up the lost pieces of her family puzzle. In a show that is both beautiful, interesting and… unfinished.
By learning later, from the mouth of her mother, that her father is not her biological father, the actress knew that she was not of Italian origin, but rather Polish. She then sets off in search of the story of her real father, who has been dead for years, a mysterious man with multiple identities. She will go from surprise to surprise, notably meeting, in 2018, a younger half-brother, Robert Polka, who lives in Montreal, in the NDG district, a few metro stations from her home!
PHOTO FABRICE GAËTAN, PROVIDED BY LE QUAT’SOUS
Robert Polka and Monique Spaziani in Thousand
Worthy of a thriller
From the flight from the Nazi regime in Austria to a new life as a jeweler in Montreal, within the Jewish diaspora, via the resistance in the South, the revelations about the father are worthy of a thriller. We will not tell here all the elements of this true story, since their discovery forms one of the pleasures of this 80-minute show.
On stage, the actress is surrounded by her own daughter (Philomène Bilodeau), her half-brother and a trio of performers of klezmer music (of Jewish origin from Central Europe). The staging is both simple and inventive, with projections of photos, documents and excerpts from false sound archives (since she has never known him), produced with the voice of Denis Bernard and reproducing the “specter” of Spaziani’s father. Of his adoptive father Spaziani and his “Italian heritage”, there will never be any question.
We must accept that we do not know everything about our past, concludes Spaziani’s investigation. And, above all, that we can never understand the full meaning of our history, of our relationship to the world. Hence the importance of creating a part of fiction in the story of one’s life, of trying to make it open to multiple interpretations. In a word: universal.
Alas, the production fails to move us at the end of this sweet and heartwarming show. Warm, nothing more. Probably because Thousand seems to constantly justify the reason for carrying out this investigation before us. As if Monique Spaziani doubted her approach… as much as her origins.
Thousand
Text: Olivier Kemeid. Director: Mani Soleymanlou. With Monique Spaziani, Philomene Bilodeau, Robert Polka, etc. A creation of the Théâtre de Quat’Sous, Orange Noyée and Trois Tristes Tigres.
At the ThreepennyUntil March 25