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    Review: In ‘With No Fanfare,’ Things Fall Apart

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    The play, a hit at the Avignon Festival, explores the twists and turns of a breakup through a whimsical mix of musical numbers and dreamlike vignettes.While romantic drama fuels much of the theatrical repertoire, what happens after a catastrophic breakup isn’t nearly as easy to translate onstage. In “With No Fanfare,” a French musical theater production directed by Samuel Achache, it takes a set that literally falls apart to establish the slow process of picking up the pieces.The metaphor is transparent, but it isn’t overblown. “With No Fanfare” (“Sans Tambour”) centers on a nameless couple, a man and a woman who have already reached their breaking point when the play starts. The man (Lionel Dray) frantically washes the dishes in a small sink; the woman (Sarah Le Picard) accuses him of caring only about clogged drains. As they trade barbs, they punch the kitchen walls, or whack household items at them. One by one, the walls collapse like a house of cards.And that’s just the first 15 minutes. What comes next — mourning and rebuilding — is told through a whimsical mix of musical numbers and dreamlike vignettes. One character lands at an imaginary clinic for broken hearts. Later, the cast re-enacts the medieval story of the star-crossed Tristan and Isolde. The process is unpredictable, tragicomic, slightly messy — and thoroughly touching.“With No Fanfare” first made a splash at the Avignon Festival last summer, and it has now reached the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord in Paris, where it feels right at home. When the director Peter Brook brought this dilapidated music hall back to life in the 1970s, he didn’t hide the visible wear and tear on the walls. The set, a two-story house designed by Lisa Navarro, has a similarly ramshackle quality, with peeling paint and a hazardous stairwell.Lisa Navarro’s set suggests a ramshackle, two-story house.Christophe Raynaud de LageOver the past decade, Achache has developed a quirky brand of musical theater, often in tandem with a co-director, Jeanne Candel. The company he founded in 2021, La Sourde, employs both musicians and actors, and “With No Fanfare” takes advantage of that as it weaves compositions by cast members and the musical director, Florent Hubert, on top of a series of lieder by Schumann.The soprano Agathe Peyrat sings many of these numbers, and acts almost as a shadow for the actors, expressing their grief-stricken feelings. Along with her, five musicians are onstage nearly throughout, and they also take smaller acting parts.More on N.Y.C. Theater, Music and Dance This SpringMusical Revivals: Why do the worst characters in musicals get the best tunes? In upcoming revivals, world leaders both real and mythical get an image makeover they may not deserve, our critic writes.Rising Stars: These actors turned playwrights all excavate memories and meaning from their lives in creating these four shows, which arrive in New York in the coming months.Gustavo Dudamel: The New York Philharmonic’s new music director, will conduct Mahler’s Ninth Symphony in May. It will be one of the hottest tickets in town.The back-and-forth between drama and music lends “With No Fanfare” much of its power, because the show’s dreamlike logic can be hard to follow. The part in which characters play Tristan and Isolde doesn’t quite land, for instance: A relationship built on a mythical love potion isn’t an ideal point of comparison for a modern couple.“With No Fanfare” is stronger when Achache and his cast (who all get a writing credit) let their imaginations roam freely. Once the central relationship has crumbled for good, the woman suddenly reappears at a treatment center where doctors offer remedies for heartbreak.There, the woman meets a third character, a writer named Spinel. Played by the actor and singer Léo-Antonin Lutinier, Spinel is a test patient for the clinic’s offbeat, metaphorical procedures. On doctors’ orders, he swims in his own tears. Later, he has surgery to remove the last remaining traces of love from his brain.“With No Fanfare” weaves a series of songs by Schumann into the narrative, as well as additional compositions by cast members.Christophe Raynaud de LageLutinier brings a dryly burlesque quality to the proceedings, and Spinel is in some ways the most affecting character, even though his relationship with the others isn’t fully fleshed out. Many scenes in “With No Fanfare” rely on plain physical comedy, as when Spinel tries to reach a piano that is hovering above the stage. He looks at it, and then brings a ladder that doesn’t reach; when he tries to climb it despite this, the steps give out under him, a Buster Keaton-style digression.Yet even the most absurd scenes have a melancholy quality to them. Achache somehow connects them to the long, frustrating process of rebuilding a life when the world you had imagined with someone collapses. As the nameless central man, Dray — an actor with over-the-top energy — spends much of the show standing precariously on a half-destroyed stool, a hammer in hand.It makes little sense on paper, yet onstage what you see is a man struggling to re-establish a sense of normalcy. Achache doesn’t aim for a tidy narrative. The characters don’t get a happy ending, or any real ending at all, but that lack of resolution rings true.At the end, Dray sits alone on the upper level of the set, dangling his legs over the edge, and surveys the ruins underneath. “And still, I coped with it,” he says, looking bemused. Mourning is a mental journey, and “With No Fanfare” makes a fitting visual and musical response to its twists and turns. More

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      In Russian Plays, Don’t Mention the War

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      Paris productions of Chekhov, Turgenev and Ostrovsky avoid current events and focus on profound truths. But the plays’ message is clear: If you rebel, you will be crushed.Since Russia invaded Ukraine almost a year ago, cultural institutions in Europe and the United States have contemplated what to do with Russian art. Tchaikovsky’s militaristic “1812 Overture?” Potentially offensive, and dropped from many concerts. Dostoyevsky? One of President Vladimir V. Putin’s favorite authors, cross-examined, in Ukraine and elsewhere, for his expansionist views.Chekhov’s plays, on the other hand? So far, nobody is pulling them from the stage.The Russian dramatic repertoire, more widely, has flown under the radar. In Paris, no fewer than four Russian plays were on at prominent playhouses in late January and early February, including Chekhov’s “The Seagull” and “Uncle Vanya,” as well as lesser-known works, such as pieces by Turgenev (“A Month in the Country”) and by Ostrovsky (“The Storm”).And the artists involved appear to be staying away from mentioning the war. While the Ukrainian flag was unfurled regularly on French stages in 2022, it made an appearance just once at the performances I saw of those four plays: At the end of Turgenev’s “A Month in the Country,” at the Athénée Théâtre Louis-Jouvet, an actor brought it out and held it during the curtain calls. Only one playbill, for “The Seagull” at the Théâtre des Abbesses, mentioned Ukraine.In a country like France, where support for Ukraine is steadfast, this is hardly for lack of sympathy. It probably has more to do with Russian theater’s reputation for universalism — the belief that a playwright like Chekhov revealed profound truths about the human condition that went far beyond Russia’s borders. As the performer Mikhail Baryshnikov, who defected from Soviet Russia in 1974 and has spoken against the war, told The New York Times last year: “The miracle of Chekhov’s writing is that, no matter where it’s performed, it feels local to the culture.”The directors of these four Russian plays presumably didn’t select them in connection to geopolitical events. The sets for all the productions I saw were tastefully vague, and the costumes mostly modern. Since theater productions in France are typically planned at least two years before they reach the stage, all would most likely have been scheduled before the invasion of Ukraine last February.Sébastien Eveno and Cyril Gueï in Chekhov’s “Uncle Vanya” at the Odéon-Théâtre de l’Europe.Marie LiebigStill, watching 19th-century plays by Chekhov, Turgenev and Ostrovsky in short succession offers a fascinating window onto Russian culture, which has long prized the performing arts. After a few nights in a row, the characters started to feel connected. The unhappily married Natalya Petrovna, in “A Month in the Country,” had a kinship with Helena in “Uncle Vanya” and Katerina in “The Storm.” All three suffer from ennui and neglect in the countryside; all three seek solace in affairs that end badly.The State of the WarA New Offensive: As the war intensifies in Eastern Ukraine, doctors struggle to handle an influx of injuries and soldiers fret over the prospect of new waves of conscripts arriving from Russia.Russia’s Economy: Shunned by the West, Russia was for a time able to redirect its oil exports to Asia and adopt sanction evasion schemes. But there are signs that Western controls are beginning to have a deep impact on the country’s energy earnings.Leadership Shake-Up: President Volodymyr Zelensky’s political party will replace Ukraine’s defense minister, Oleksii Reznikov. The expected move comes amid a widening corruption scandal, although Mr. Reznikov was not implicated in wrongdoing.Nuclear Fears Abate: U.S. policymakers and intelligence analysts are less worried about Russia using nuclear weapons in the war. But the threat could re-emerge, they say.It’s no coincidence, of course. Ostrovsky and Turgenev were acquainted, and Chekhov, who came of age later in the 19th century, knew his predecessors’ work and name-checks both in “Uncle Vanya.”The themes they explored speak to social rifts that manifest across cultures. Class struggles, such as landowners’ power over regular workers or the disdain of urban professors and artists for country life, underpin the characters’ relationships, as does this patriarchal society’s hold over women. (Bad weather and alcohol also feature prominently.) Patriotic wars don’t come calling for local men, unlike in many Russian novels.Pauline Bolcatto and Naasz in “The Seagull.” The production makes an impassioned case for Chekhov as a vessel for the world’s feelings rather than for any specific sense of Russian-ness. Gilles Le MaoBrigitte Jaques-Wajeman’s “The Seagull” makes the most impassioned case for Chekhov as a vessel for the world’s feelings rather than for any specific sense of Russian-ness. She has opted for a very spare production at the Théâtre des Abbesses, the second stage of the Théâtre de la Ville: Beyond a painted backdrop evoking the lake mentioned in the play, the cast only has a small elevated stage made of wooden blocks and a few tables and chairs to work with.Yet every element is used beautifully. One of Jaques-Wajeman’s great strengths lies in the precision of her work with actors, and here, she brings individual color out of each. As Nina, the country girl who dreams of becoming an actress, Pauline Bolcatto starts off as a ball of innocent enthusiasm, while Hélène Bressiant brings a touch of goth nihilism to the resigned Masha. As Arkadina, the successful and snobbish actress visiting her country home, Raphaèle Bouchard rocks improbable turbans and fuchsia pants.This “Seagull” brought out a constant from Russian play to Russian play: Practically everyone in them, no matter how rich or successful, feels emotionally stunted.It is true, too, of “A Month in the Country” and “The Storm,” two plays that are seen much less often in the West. The plot of Ostrovsky’s “The Storm,” which had its premiere in 1859, is perhaps better known outside Russia through “Kat’a Kabanova,” the 1921 Janacek opera named after the play’s central character. Kat’a, or Katerina, is saddled with a husband she doesn’t love and an overbearing mother-in-law. She starts a covert relationship with Boris, who has recently arrived in her small town, only to become overwhelmed by the moral implications.Denis Podalydès brought a sensitive, visually elegant production of “The Storm” to the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord, led by the arresting Mélodie Richard as Katerina. A photograph showing the Volga River is reproduced in the background on wooden panels, which are later turned over to create a simple, two-tiered structure for Katerina and Boris’s nighttime escapades in the bushes.Stéphane Facco and Clémence Boué in “A Month in the Country” at the Athénée Théâtre Louis-Jouvet.Juliette Parisot“The Storm” and “A Month in the Country” both show humans chafing against curtailed horizons. In “A Month in the Country,” Natalya Petrovna, a woman who falls for her son’s young tutor, isn’t the only one to suffer. Like Masha in “The Seagull,” the young Vera, an orphan who lives with Natalya’s family, sees her options in life for what they are and resigns herself to a joyless marriage.Juliette Léger conveys Vera’s arc with admirable ease in Clément Hervieu-Léger’s captivating production of “A Month in the Country.” The entire cast, in fact, struck a bittersweet, realistic balance between comedy and tragedy, from Clémence Boué (Natalya) to Stéphane Facco (wondrous in the role of Rakitin, Natalya’s platonic companion).Yet for all the emotional truth in these characters, from Turgenev and Ostrovsky to Chekhov, the sentence for those who stray is harsh. They all fail. At best, they return to a dull life; sometimes, suicide is their preferred option.It is a bleak outlook for domestic dramas. Nobody is calling for these plays to be canceled, but to call them “universal” is a little too easy. In Russian theater, if you rebel against social norms, you will be crushed.That, in itself, is a message. More

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      Tiago Rodrigues’s Theater of Compassion

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      Three stage works in Paris by the incoming director of the Avignon Festival continue his preoccupation with empathy and human complexity.PARIS — There is something about the Portuguese writer and director Tiago Rodrigues that inspires affection. It is an odd thing to feel about an artist in his position: As the incoming director of the Avignon Festival, one of the biggest events on the European performance calendar, he is suddenly a very powerful man in French theater — and with that comes a new level of critical scrutiny.Yet time and again over the past month, as three of Rodrigues’s productions were presented in quick succession in Paris, the heartfelt, considerate way in which he approached characters melted my heart. First, there were the stories of humanitarian workers teetering between miracle and catastrophe in “Insofar as the Impossible.” “Lovers’ Choir,” a chamber work in which two voices speaking in unison somehow become a potent metaphor for mutual devotion, followed.And then came “Catarina and the Beauty of Killing Fascists,” a work that simply shouldn’t work the way it does. Just try to picture a successful play about a family whose quirky little tradition is to hunt down and kill fascists — until the youngest daughter struggles with becoming a, you know, murderer.If the premise of “Catarina” sounds histrionic, the result is anything but. As a rule, Rodrigues isn’t a showy director: He is a humanist at heart, preoccupied with empathy and the ways in which today’s world undermines it. His actors tend to address the audience frontally yet modestly, as if asking us to bear witness to each character’s doubts and flaws.“Catarina” and “Lovers’ Choir” were programmed as a double bill of sorts at the Bouffes du Nord. The 45-minute “Lovers’ Choir,” in an early evening slot, is an unassuming sequel to the first play Rodrigues wrote, in Lisbon, 15 years ago. In it, a couple experience a life-or-death emergency: A woman suddenly can’t breathe, so her partner drives her to the hospital, against the clock.Rodrigues has revived and expanded the story in this new version, created last year for French actors. At the start, Alma Palacios and David Geselson stand side by side, looking ahead at the auditorium yet united in fear, as they begin their race to find medical help. They speak in sync throughout. When she says, “I can’t breathe,” he says, “She can’t breathe” at the same time; on a nearly bare stage, they bring the scene to life solely through their intertwined words, a chorus of two.It makes for a delicately urgent narrative, in which breathing together comes to represent both love and life. When Palacios and Geselson are purposely out of sync, here and there, you know danger lurks.Alma Palacios and David Geselson in “Lovers’ Choir” at the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord.Filipe FerreiraThe second half throws this new version of “Lovers’ Choir” out of balance, however. Once the emergency is dealt with, the story suddenly accelerates. The characters zoom through the ensuing decades, listing milestones in their lives without giving us much time to latch onto them.“Insofar as the Impossible” and “Catarina” show how much Rodrigues’s work has gained in ambition over the years. His rise to prominence in France in the 2010s came via intimate, confessional works, like 2013’s “By Heart,” in which he shared the life of his grandmother and asked audience members to memorize a poem, and 2017’s “Sopro,” which starred the longtime prompter of the theater Rodrigues directed in Lisbon until recently, the Teatro Nacional D. Maria II.There are real stories at the heart of “Insofar as the Impossible,” too. The script of this production, at the Odéon-Théâtre de l’Europe, wove together excerpts from 30 or so interviews that Rodrigues and his team conducted with humanitarian workers from the International Committee of the Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders.It fits into a style of documentary theater that has become popular in recent years. While French directors like Didier Ruiz have brought interviewees to the stage, however, Rodrigues has entrusted their words to four actors, who speak in a mix of French, English and Portuguese, in keeping with Rodrigues’s love of multilingualism. (He announced recently that under his direction, there would be a special focus on a different language every year at the Avignon Festival, starting with English in 2023.)Throughout, the geographical areas that humanitarian workers travel to — to provide relief from war, disasters or other emergencies — are referred to as “the Impossible,” and the comfortable Western homes they leave behind are “the Possible.” It means the audience can’t connect the anecdotes with what they may know of the region or the conflict; instead, we are invited to consider how violence, inhumanity — and dignity, too — manifest regardless of culture.Wisely, given the gut-punching nature of many scenes, Rodrigues treads lightly as director. The sets stop at a large white cloth that is slowly pulled above the stage. Many of the situations described are too harrowing to summarize neatly; suffice to say that, while humanitarian workers generally choose their line of work out of a desire to do good, “doing good” turns out to be a lot more complicated than it seems.Making a virtuous contribution is also what drives the family at the heart of “Catarina,” a work of fiction Rodrigues created with a Portuguese cast. To this family, however, that means capturing a fascist each year, following a tradition passed down by a female relative who, in the 1950s, avenged the death of her friend Catarina under Portugal’s military dictatorship. Per her wish, all her descendants are called Catarina, regardless of gender, and in Rodrigues’s engaging production, wear long dresses and aprons.Romeu Costa, left, and Rui M. Silva in “Catarina and the Beauty of Killing Fascists” at the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord.Filipe FerreiraEach death and garden burial is celebrated with songs and a banquet. Yet the youngest Catarina, who was raised to kill and is about to shoot her first victim, starts experiencing doubts about her right to take a life.In a recurring joke, the characters keep quoting the German playwright Bertolt Brecht, and like Brecht, Rodrigues nudges the audience to adopt a critical perspective. Rodrigues’s father was an antifascist activist, and “Catarina” is preoccupied with weighty political questions: When fascist forces are on the rise in a democracy, what are the best means of countering them? Is “doing harm in order to practice good,” the family’s motto, morally acceptable?Many of the conversations that result between relatives — a mother urging her daughter to violence; a sister angling to take her place — could easily turn into caricatures, yet Rodrigues refuses to give the audience an easy path out of these ethical dilemmas. He doesn’t shy away from showing us what he means by fascism, either. One lengthy scene is devoted to a far-right political speech full of such hatred toward minorities that Rodrigues seems to be testing our endurance.Yet even this part of “Catarina” feels like an invitation to grapple with what humanity is capable of, rather than a didactic demonstration. Complexity is always the answer in Rodrigues’s work — and it is one of the best ways to the audience’s heart.Dans la Mesure de l’Impossible. Directed by Tiago Rodrigues. Odéon-Théâtre de l’Europe/Festival d’Automne. Further performances in 2022 and 2023 around France and in Madrid.Chœur des Amants. Directed by Tiago Rodrigues. Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord, through Oct. 29.Catarina et la Beauté de Tuer des Fascistes. Directed by Tiago Rodrigues. Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord/Festival d’Automne, through Oct. 30. More