Seller of Real Dreams

The second performance by director Joël Pomre at the NET festival is “This Child,” which he staged with Russian actors at the Praktika theater. The French version of This Child was made for a social commission (the Calvados Family Benefit Fund), and the text of the play was written based on interviews with women from the poor Norman suburbs. The result is a semi-documentary study of family conflicts and relationships between fathers and children.

Joel POMRA told Kristina MATVIENKO how he comes up with his plays and why he combines the functions of playwright and director.

— This is your first time working in Russia, what are your impressions of Russian actors?

- Either because these are Russian actors, or because I chose them so well, but they are very good. During the week of casting, I looked at about forty people and chose seven.

—What is decisive for you when choosing actors?

- Presence. Real existence - before they play, and at the moment when they play. Of course I'm looking for good actors, but also people with human qualities. Those who are ready for teamwork. And those who would not look like actors. If such a person walked into a room, we would not say that he is an actor.

— Is the version of the Russian play the same as the original?

-- The characters are the same, but the personalities of the actors are different. The Praktika Theater has a very small stage, and in this regard, very important changes have to be made.

—Your performances often touch on social issues. Do you think that theater can influence life or is it an attempt to reflect on painful topics?

- It seems to me that in the theater you can talk about everything and reflect any human realities. I don't think theater can change anything, but it is a place where you can show things differently than they are reflected in newspapers, on television or just in life. I can show their image and how I see them. For example, we cannot say that Chekhov wrote on social topics, but in his plays he talks about work, about the end of a historical era, his characters discuss current social issues. Of course, I am interested in these topics, but this is not the only thing I talk about.

—Why do you write your own performances entirely yourself?

- Because I'm not a director. I'm the author. And this excites and captivates me, this is the motivation. It seems to me that staging a mise-en-scène is a rather difficult thing, which requires a lot of work and is tiring. And at the moment of writing, when you come up with, invent a play, the imagination is completely free. To stage it, you have to materialize the imaginary, this is necessary, but for me it’s not particularly pleasant.

- But are you forcing yourself?

- Yes, in life you have to deal with a lot.

—You said at a press conference that the film that inspired you to create “The Merchants” was Dreyer’s “Joan of Arc.” Where do you generally look for sources of artistic inspiration?

- Of course, cinema can be this source. When I write, I use both pictures and words. And the pictures that inspire me can come from cinema, painting, from my imagination or my dreams. From a documentary or from life. There are many possibilities.

— In “Merchants,” language and gesture are separated. What causes this?

— As an author, for quite a long time I paid a lot of attention to the word. When you're a writer, the first thing that comes to mind is to let people talk. Now I think that even in the theater it is possible to compose without making the characters speak. You can tell something simply by showing people who live, move, act. And so in this performance I decided to use words only to explain the most necessary things.

— Are your “Traders” successful among ordinary viewers?

- It seems to me, yes. Of course, the audience is discouraged - it is unusual for them to see such theater. But still, the performances have been running successfully for three years now, and the hall is always full. I don't know if it's because people really enjoy the show or if they're just curious.

—What does your company exist for? Does the government subsidize you?

- There are subsidies from the state, but this part is less than what we receive from theaters that buy our performances. Our “trade turnover” last year amounted to 1 million 500 thousand euros, and only 300 thousand of them were subsidies from the state.

- Do you have a permanent troupe?

- You can say so.

— Do you know anything about modern Russian theater?

- No, a little. I have the impression that modern theater is not very developed in Russia compared to the repertory theater, where plays by Chekhov, Shakespeare... Great, in general, authors are staged.