Sophie Perez & Xavier Boussiron
Created in 1997 and run by Sophie Perez, the Compagnie du Zerep has been composed, for the last 10 years, of a permanent core of artists, among whom the musician Xavier Boussiron. Since El coup du cric andalou, in 2004, they have co-signed plays belonging to a theatre without any complex and deliberately freed from the slightest hierarchy. All the social layers come together and move apart. The text, actors and props constitute nothing but a protean whole. Movement is permanent and often borders representation, for an always useful questioning of the idea of the theatre we have in mind. The list of themes taken up since 1997 can appear like an inventory of disarray, since it includes, among others, a method for learning to swim without water, an exploration of night-time venues (Détail sur la marche arrière), a sort of lecture on the unconscious and obsessions (Leutti), a way of getting rid of the cabaret (El Coup du cric andalou), an encounter with Louise Bourgeois, Charles Aznavour and the practice of pottery (Enjambe Charles), a historical reconstitution (Bartabas tabasse), the adaptation of Lorenzaccio by Alfred de Musset with the very evocative title Laisse les gondoles à Venise, a theatre epic after Possessed by Witold Gombrowicz, the Gombrowiczshow... However, Sophie Perez and Xavier Boussiron leave nothing to chance, and especially not the choice of their actors. Faithful partners, they closely take part in the elaboration of the shows: together, they are inspired by cinema - horror films among others -, documentaries and a wide variety of musics, writings with none debarred, visual creations, the Grand Guignol or archetypes of light comedy, while bringing a kindly and suspicious love to the mask of the Comedia dell'Arte, the exemplary symbol of a theatre that claims to be outside any classification. This joyous devouring permits Sophie Perez and Xavier Boussiron to restore all the elements of a liberating dream-nightmare, thought-out and built with passion, which never leaves anyone indifferent. The Festival d'Avignon is welcoming them for the first time.
JFP, May, 2011.