Philippe Le Moine gives Actes du
Théâtre a report on Channels (France),
a Franco-British exchange, for which a great deal
of energy has been mustered on both sides of the Channel.
"Channels both implies a gulf
and the possibility of a connection. It's nothing
more than a marriage frankly."
Jack Bradley, Head of Scripts, National Theatre
Starting from a desire on the part of Jack Bradley
and Sue Higginson (Director of the National Theatre
Studio) to get a better grasp of contemporary French
playwriting, as well as from a small grant (5 000
euros) from the French Embassy, the Channels project
has since developed into the largest Franco-British
exchange ever undertaken in the field of contemporary
playwriting.
In January 2000, Sue and Jack entrusted me with the
project, which started off with a long period of research
conducted with Entr'Actes, naturally, as well as with
the main figures in contemporary playwriting in France,
including publishers, literary agencies, the Théâtre
Ouvert and the Mousson d'été Festival.
Subsequently, I was sent a huge number of plays to
read, while the project's main focus and the plans
for carrying it out were gradually being more sharply
defined.
Translating has traditionally been a domain for playwrights
in Great Britain, where a dearth of organisations
- such as the Maison Antoine-Vitez - and audience
expectations have produced an illustrious line of
playwright/translators including Tom Stoppard, Martin
Crimp and Christopher Hampton, as well as David Lan
and Nicholas Wright. The National Theatre Studio,
created in 1984, is like a springboard, a place where
most young British playwrights have come to and been
in residence at one time. Thus the idea arose of finding
the future translators for Channels among those playwrights.
Beyond its role of translating plays, we feel that
Channels is a unique opportunity to develop exchanges
between French and British playwrights, and to provide
them with a chance to explore other writing styles,
approaches and issues.
In choosing the French plays we naturally turned to
living playwrights whose work had not been translated
in Great Britain before, and to their most recent
plays. I chose twenty from among a hundred texts before
putting together a reading committee whose weighty
task was to select the three plays for the project
- so weighty in fact that we ended up choosing four!
Faire Bleu by Jean-Paul Wenzel, Hilda by Marie NDiaye,
Combats de possédés by Laurent Gaudé
and Habitations by Philippe Minyana.
We immediately commissioned the annotated literal
translations - giving Jack and Sue a chance to read
the plays - which would be used later on as a starting
point for the playwright/translators. Before choosing
the latter, Jack, Sue and I decided to meet with the
French playwrights in Paris, in order to take things
a step further than the text and to grasp their worlds,
their personalities and their ways of working. We
also began to discuss the possibility during that
trip of working together on projects with Véronique
Bellegarde from the Mousson d'été Festival.
Feeling confident after this first exchange, we then
contacted the four British playwrights: Lin Coghlan,
Sarah Woods, Mick Mahoney and Steve Waters. For all
four of them it was their first translating experience.
In October 2000, we organised a two-day seminar at
the Studio, during which the four playwright/ translators
had a chance to become familiar with the world of
translating and to benefit from the experience of
Nicholas Wright and David Lan before getting down
to work.
Once the first drafts were finished, we began the
most exciting phase of the project - the residences.
In turn Jean-Paul Wenzel, Philippe Minyana and Laurent
Gaudé came to spend a week at the Studio with
their British translators and the authors of the literal
translations. Sarah Woods went to Paris with Rachael
McGill to work with Marie NDiaye in a room at the
sacd's Maison des Auteurs on rue Ballu. It is hard
to sum up in a few words the importance of the work
accomplished there, the many moments of rare delight,
and also the difficulty in getting to know one another
and in exploring common ground, areas of understanding
and exchange. At times the work was very technical
and amounted to systematically dissecting the plays.
A great deal of time was also spent on comparing how
the language of theatre functions in the two countries.
Thus French allows neutral writing, while English
is obsessed with regional and class-related accents
that force you to "situate" the language
right away within a certain context or voice. Then
there is the influence on the writing itself caused
by a difference in the relationship between playwright
and director down to the very essence of the latter's
role, which is hegemonic in France and text-oriented
in Britain. There is a marked contrast in the use
of and need for scene indications. Finally, there
are basic choices regarding cultural specificity and
questions of transposition. What is the best way of
handling the many references to cities in the French
provinces in Habitations? Would it be better to move
Faire Bleu to the north of England?
Translating is about making choices, listening and
having confidence. These few days spent together made
it possible to go beyond the words to explore the
most secret and personal places in the language (rhythms,
colours, contrasts, intentions, memories, imagination,
etc) which are the source of one's delight in writing
and one's need to do it. These areas that are so difficult
to translate are the very places where the two playwrights
will ultimately be able to find each other, to validate
the accuracy of their intentions and to cement feelings
of mutual trust. The work done on Faire Bleu is an
excellent example of this: "The project was a
rather new experience for me. It was a rich and extraordinary
one", said Jean-Paul Wenzel. "We didn't
speak the same language, yet we managed to understand
each other at some mysterious level that is hard to
describe to someone who hasn't experienced it,"
replied Lin Coghlan. Philippe Minyana, Steve Waters
and Christopher Campbell also got on well, as did
Marie NDiaye, Sarah Woods and Rachael McGill. The
only fly in the ointment was Mick Mahoney, who didn't
succeed in devoting the time and attention required
for the preparatory work on Combats de possédés.
After his meeting with Laurent Gaudé we decided
to start from scratch and commission a new translation.
That's only one failed marriage out of four, so we're
still below the national average!
In March 2001, Habitats, Hilda and Rising Blue were
completed and we organised some small readings at
the Studio so that the translators could hear their
work before making the final corrections and submitting
the definitive text. Jean-Paul Wenzel came for the
occasion. Michel Didym and Véronique Bellegarde
were also there to talk about the meec project (Maison
des écritures européennes contemporaines).
As our approaches and aspirations were similar, we
decided to work together. The Studio will commission
the translation of a fifth play chosen from the repertoire
of the Mousson d'été. The meec will
undertake its first bilateral exchange with the translation
of three British plays chosen with the help of the
Studio. The two projects will end with public readings:
the three British plays at the Studio Théâtre
de la Comédie-Française in February
2002, and the five plays from the Channels project
at the National Theatre in June 2002 as part of its
gigantic Transformation project. Now we're in the
process of sending off new plays, and also looking
for new support. The French Embassy in London and
the Institut français have decided to continue
their support for the French playwrights' residencies;
the British Council in Paris has done the same for
the British playwrights in France; and the afaa is
providing assistance for hosting the French playwrights
and professionals during the readings in London.
The meec first chose The Mentalists by Richard Bean
and Lionel Spycher and Chris Campbell for the translation.
The Channels model had to adapt to particularities
and habits in France, where this kind of "work
for four hands" is very rare and frowned upon
by translators. The next play was Gagarin Way by Gregory
Burke, entrusted to Dominique Hollier, and Mother
Clap's Molly House by Mark Ravenhill, tackled by Gérard
Watkins. While choosing the translators turned out
to be difficult at times, the residency concept proved
to be vital. It took place at Pont-à-Mousson
in the snowy month of January 2002 and was an indispensable
starting point for the work undertaken by Lionel Spycher,
Dominique Hollier and Gérard Watkins. Meanwhile
at the Studio, David Greig - who took over the translation
of Combats de possédés - got along perfectly
with Laurent Gaudé. Finally, I loved Poeub
and had to hand Serge Valletti and his 65 characters
over to Richard Bean. The Journée britannique
on 23 February, organised by the meec, was a huge
success brought off by great actors in the presence
of the British playwrights. It was an opportunity
for a first meeting between Valletti and Bean.
The Channels (France) readings series, a first at
the National Theatre, were off for another three weeks
on Wednesday and Friday afternoons in the Lyttelton
Theatre. Each play was entrusted to a director who
formed his own group of actors, and they rehearsed
at the Studio for two days. All of the playwrights
(except for Marie NDiaye) came to the readings. The
main French partners (the meec, the Maison Antoine-Vitez
and Entr'Actes-sacd) and British theatre professionals
were invited, including heads of theatres, directors,
dramaturgs, producers, agents and academics. There
was an average of a hundred people attending every
reading, and projects are already in progress with
theatre companies and with the bbc (radio and television).
Oberon Books has published all five plays (unusual
for works that have only been staged as readings),
thus extending the Channels (France) project into
the future and promoting the plays throughout the
English-speaking world.
Channels (France) ended with a reading of Le Pub!
(the first full-length reading of Serge Valletti's
play) with 60 actors, giving a "gargantuan"
final touch to a project that had begun two years
earlier on a much smaller scale. The French adventure
at the Studio is continuing through long-term ties
with the meec and other European partners. As for
the Channels adventure, it is to be continued in Argentina
and in the Balkans.
Philippe Le Moine, International Projects Manager
at the National Theatre Studio
For more information about Channels and the nt Studio,
contact: plemoine@nationaltheatre.org.uk
www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/backstage/studio
To order the 5 translations: www.oberonbooks.com
|