Olivier Py, "My Exalted youth", press conference of the 7 July 2022

“Something’s coming! Something’s always coming. What if nothing came?” A forgotten poet, Alcandre senses in a pizza delivery boy the insolence and exuberance of a new Harlequin. Flanked by a quartet of young actors, the histrion and his mentor prepare pranks that will become the cornerstones of an epic tetralogy. Harlequin’s beginnings? A falsified poem which puts poetics to the test of vanities. Harlequin’s betrayal? The counterfeiting of a saint. Harlequin’s death? In a cannibal restaurant popular among the powerful. Harlequin’s triumph? A fake death and resurrection. With Harlequin, Olivier Py explores a mythic figure of comedy and turns it into a sweet, patched, multicoloured, and flamboyant hero on a quest for transcendence. Within the gymnase Aubanel, the author and director, along with his faithful scenographer Pierre-André Weitz, reinstall the varnished wood set they imagined twenty-seven years ago for La Servante. Under Harlequin’s power, the proscenium becomes a performing machine for ten actors and two musicians in this tragi-comic adventure. Alongside Céline Chéenne, who appeared in La Servante, Bertrand de Roffignac, a perfect Harlequin, Xavier Gallais as the Rimbaud-obsessed Alcandre, and a new generation of actors enliven this epic at the crossroads of the manifesto, the celebration, and the pilgrimage. A passing of the baton, from one generation to the next.