Kliniken
by Lars Norén
directed by Julie Duclos
estimated duration 2h40
Odéon 6e
© © Simon Gosselin
with
Mithkal Alzghair
Alexandra Gentil
David Gouhier
Émilie Incerti Formentini
Manon Kneusé
Yohan Lopez
Stéphanie Marc
Cyril Metzger
Leïla Muse
Alix Riemer
Maxime Thebault
Étienne Toqué
An institution for the mentally ill. A dozen suffering beings, of all ages, roam about... Nothing funny? Yet they manage to make us smile sometimes. It's absurd, but that's life. In fact, according to Julie Duclos, « perhaps we were this close to end up in there ». The director comes back to the Odéon with a « modern-day fresco », enlivened by the poetic, razor-sharp langage of Sweden’s most important contemporary playwright. How is one to live apart from oneself? As Lars Norén's characters arrange the fragments of their wounded stories, a musical composition seems to emerge from the chaos. Images projected on the walls of the ward sometimes enlarge their space – outwards, opening up escapes towards « an Eden or a breath of air », or inwards, revealing glimpses of intimacy, « catching poetry where it went unsuspected ».
