With “7 minutes”, in the theater as in the factory

Eleven women and seven minutes: these are the ingredients of Stefano Massini’s play that Maëlle Poésy directs at the Théâtre du Vieux-Colombier. That is to say 11 workers regrouping in their factory after a day’s work and who will have, for an hour and a half, to decide their future and that of 200 of their colleagues.

Their dilemma? Keep the same working conditions and be resigned to job cuts or save all jobs by reducing the daily break by seven minutes, which already has only fifteen. “This piece asks us about how to form a group, what sacrifices to make for others, how to create utopia together. In short, it is a perfect metaphor for the times ”, appreciates the director who is collaborating for the second time with the Comédie-Française.

Inspired by the documentary

After some e-mail exchanges with the Italian author, Maëlle Poésy left with her team to textile factories in northern France. I was struck by the noise, the multiplicity of impersonal positions, the obsession with timing, remembers the 30-something. We quickly realized in situ that there was not really a place designed for a meeting like the one described in the play. From there, was born the idea that the decor would be that of a storage room: not comfortable, not very conducive to reflection, a place of passage where everything can be heard.

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These trips fueled the idea of ​​shaping the stage following a documentary inspiration. Floor and walls of a bland blue-gray, metal shelves, light without sophistication, actors dressed in ordinary street clothes … In short, “A realistic and less ostentatious scenography possible which can above all leave room for dialogues and the architecture of bodies in space, modulations and games of gaze which form like a sub-text”, summarizes the one who began her career in dance with high-level choreographers, such as Damien Jalet or Hofesh Shechter.

Meeting with the workers

Maëlle Poésy works here with seven women from the Comédie-Française troupe and four from outside. “I made them read and hear interviews I had conducted with workers, we listened to podcasts on the social context, saw documentaries and films like The Municipality, by Peter Watkins or In war, by Stéphane Brizé “, she explains. There followed a phase of improvisations then a slow appropriation of the text, interspersed with meetings with a few workers from the north of France, who in turn came to visit in March 2020.

They were surprised at times to hear words or to glimpse such plausible situations. These employees were also invited to come and discover the premiere of the play which questions the fear of downgrading and the cruelty of the capitalist system… And then a global pandemic has passed by, forcing the performances to be postponed by a year and a half.

Massini’s text shows the movement of a group with attempts to influence but also emphasizes that any point of view is respectable “, Maëlle Poésy analysis. We can not judge those who want to save their skin or those who campaign for the collective – “It is not the characters but the situation that is violent”. Around the two-front stage, the spectators surround the actresses on stands facing each other: and become involved, as if sitting at the negotiating table. Called to reflect on the same moral dilemma by following the meanders of a collective reflection, of a decision in the process of being born.

7 minutes, by Stefano Massini, directed by Maëlle Poésy, Théâtre du Vieux-Colombier, Paris 6e. Until October 17.

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