Latest news with #Avignon
New York Times
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- New York Times
The Pelicot Trial Returns, This Time to the Stage
The buzz of this year's Avignon Festival was a play set inside a medieval convent, not far from the courthouse where six months ago Gisèle Pelicot confronted her ex-husband and dozens of men accused of raping her while she was deeply drugged. The play had a simple name: 'The Pelicot Trial.' By the French playwright Servane Dècle and the Swiss director Milo Rau, it promised to distill into four hours the four-month trial that rocked France. All 51 defendants in the case were found guilty, most on charges of rape. The case jolted the country into difficult questions around the pervasiveness of rape, the widespread use of pharmaceuticals to drug women and commit abuse, and the uncomfortably familiar face of rapists who are also fathers, uncles, brothers, neighbors. The playwright, Ms. Dècle, told French radio that the work was taking up the demand by Ms. Pelicot, who had waived her right to a closed-door trial and insisted that the videos of the hundreds of rapes she suffered, all of which were filmed and cataloged by her husband, be played publicly in court, to 'look rape straight in the eyes.' As on most days of the trial, a line had formed outside the building where the stage was set, led by women looking for last-minute tickets to the show, which played one night at the festival but is being staged elsewhere. Some said they had come to witness how the director would meld the case into art, and to process their own personal stories of sexual violence. Two women near the front were in tears. 'I think men felt protected before. They let things slide,' said one woman in line, Nathalie Le Meur, a 54-year-old art therapist. 'Because of this trial, they realize they could potentially end up in court.' Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
The Guardian
7 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘It's ourselves and society on trial': playwright adapts Gisèle Pelicot case for stage
A stage play based on the trial of the men who drugged and raped Gisèle Pelicot will be staged this week in the southern city of Avignon, as France continues to debate the lessons for society from the country's biggest ever rape trial. The three-hour performance, The Pelicot Trial: Tribute to Gisèle Pelicot, has been created by Milo Rau, the Swiss director and playwright acclaimed for his theatre interpretations of court proceedings, including the Moscow trial of the Russian punks Pussy Riot and the trial of the Romanian despot Nicolae Ceaușescu. The play has the backing of Pelicot's lawyers and feminist groups, and Rau says he felt compelled to turn the trial into a theatre piece: 'To have done nothing would have been like not speaking of Gaza or of Ukraine, it would have been a silence that's complicit.' The director said the Pelicot piece was about looking at rape culture, the trivialisation of rape and patriarchy in all its forms. 'Through the Pelicot trial, it's ourselves and our society on trial,' he said. Pelicot was hailed worldwide after she waived her right to anonymity to ensure a public trial of her ex-husband, Dominique Pelicot, who drugged her unconscious and invited dozens of men on an internet forum to come to her bedroom and rape her for almost a decade from 2011 in the southern village of Mazan. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison in December and guilty verdicts were returned for all the 51 accused men. Gisèle Pelicot, who had said in court she wanted 'all of society to be a witness' and 'shame must change sides', was this week given France's top civic honour, the Legion d'Honneur, in recognition of her determination to expose and change what she called a 'macho, patriarchal society that trivialises rape'. Rau, who worked with the playwright Servane Dècle to create the performance, said Pelicot's decision to choose a public trial instead of holding the case behind closed doors had in effect opened up the courtroom like a theatre. 'So we thought we should perhaps now turn the theatre into a courtroom,' he said. The performance is made up of staged readings of extracts from the trial, police files, social commentary and psychiatric reports. It looks at the 51 convicted and the question of how these men, including a nurse, a soldier, a journalist, a prison warden and delivery drivers, aged from 26 to 74, could travel to Pelicot's home to rape her. More than 50 performers will read extracts from the trial, and those on stage will include a psychiatric expert from the case and court artists who were present at the trial. Rau said it was important to stage the theatre piece in Avignon, where the trial took place and where crowds had gathered outside the court daily to cheer Gisèle Pelicot, and where the city walls were plastered with her quotes. It will be staged in a 14th-century open-air Carmelite cloister, with seats for 500 people, as part of the city's renowned theatre festival. But, with massive local interest, Rau said it would also be livestreamed in cinemas in Avignon as well as online. Rau said he had resolved to create the piece while he was preparing another play, La Lettre, for the Avignon festival. Having tackled other major trials on stage, he said it would have been a 'kind of absurd silence' not to also work on the Pelicot case. 'In the German-speaking world, Avignon is not famous for the theatre festival, it's famous for the Pelicot trial.' Pelicot's lawyers approved the idea, and journalists and researchers willingly gave Rau and Dècle thousands of pages of their notebooks to piece together the trial. 'It was clear for everyone that we had to do this, particularly here in Avignon and particularly now,' he said. The trial presented difficult topics for staged readings. 'At the start, there were many different issues – the rapists themselves, rape culture, masculinity, the family, the spaces where this took place,' Rau said. 'And then we followed the line of the trial and the questions it raised in society, in the media, and in people's minds.' The performance looks at the cross-examination of the accused men as well as their initial questioning by police, showing their shifting awareness of what was at stake. 'We see really what culture they're coming from, the patriarchal system, fraternity and rape culture that produces this,' Rau said. 'There was a moment of growing awareness in this city, but also in this country and in civilisation as a whole, to understand human relationships and how they have developed under a regime of capitalism, a regime of internet pornography, patriarchy, and drug-induced abuse.' The piece underlined to him how 'omnipresent' rape was in society, Rau said. A first performance took place at the Vienna festival last month, lasting seven hours, and the play will travel to other cities including Lisbon, Belgrade and Warsaw. Dècle, the play's co-writer, said: 'It's about pulling at all the threads with the audience to understand what is it that made these men – who were so different from one another – converge on that bedroom, share recipes for drugging women, suggest women close to them who should also be raped, and doing all of that while having apparently ordinary lives. It's very important what this says about our society today.' The Pelicot Trial: Tribute to Gisèle Pelicot, Avignon festival, 18 July and streamed online
The Guardian
7 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘It's ourselves and society on trial': playwright adapts Gisèle Pelicot case for stage
A stage play based on the trial of the men who drugged and raped Gisèle Pelicot will be staged this week in the southern city of Avignon, as France continues to debate the lessons for society from the country's biggest ever rape trial. The three-hour performance, The Pelicot Trial: Tribute to Gisèle Pelicot, has been created by Milo Rau, the Swiss director and playwright acclaimed for his theatre interpretations of court proceedings, including the Moscow trial of the Russian punks Pussy Riot and the trial of the Romanian despot Nicolae Ceaușescu. The play has the backing of Pelicot's lawyers and feminist groups, and Rau says he felt compelled to turn the trial into a theatre piece: 'To have done nothing would have been like not speaking of Gaza or of Ukraine, it would have been a silence that's complicit.' The director said the Pelicot piece was about looking at rape culture, the trivialisation of rape and patriarchy in all its forms. 'Through the Pelicot trial, it's ourselves and our society on trial,' he said. Pelicot was hailed worldwide after she waived her right to anonymity to ensure a public trial of her ex-husband, Dominique Pelicot, who drugged her unconscious and invited dozens of men on an internet forum to come to her bedroom and rape her for almost a decade from 2011 in the southern village of Mazan. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison in December and guilty verdicts were returned for all the 51 accused men. Gisèle Pelicot, who had said in court she wanted 'all of society to be a witness' and 'shame must change sides', was this week given France's top civic honour, the Legion d'Honneur, in recognition of her determination to expose and change what she called a 'macho, patriarchal society that trivialises rape'. Rau, who worked with the playwright Servane Dècle to create the performance, said Pelicot's decision to choose a public trial instead of holding the case behind closed doors had in effect opened up the courtroom like a theatre. 'So we thought we should perhaps now turn the theatre into a courtroom,' he said. The performance is made up of staged readings of extracts from the trial, police files, social commentary and psychiatric reports. It looks at the 51 convicted and the question of how these men, including a nurse, a soldier, a journalist, a prison warden and delivery drivers, aged from 26 to 74, could travel to Pelicot's home to rape her. More than 50 performers will read extracts from the trial, and those on stage will include a psychiatric expert from the case and court artists who were present at the trial. Rau said it was important to stage the theatre piece in Avignon, where the trial took place and where crowds had gathered outside the court daily to cheer Gisèle Pelicot, and where the city walls were plastered with her quotes. It will be staged in a 14th-century open-air Carmelite cloister, with seats for 500 people, as part of the city's renowned theatre festival. But, with massive local interest, Rau said it would also be livestreamed in cinemas in Avignon as well as online. Rau said he had resolved to create the piece while he was preparing another play, La Lettre, for the Avignon festival. Having tackled other major trials on stage, he said it would have been a 'kind of absurd silence' not to also work on the Pelicot case. 'In the German-speaking world, Avignon is not famous for the theatre festival, it's famous for the Pelicot trial.' Pelicot's lawyers approved the idea, and journalists and researchers willingly gave Rau and Dècle thousands of pages of their notebooks to piece together the trial. 'It was clear for everyone that we had to do this, particularly here in Avignon and particularly now,' he said. The trial presented difficult topics for staged readings. 'At the start, there were many different issues – the rapists themselves, rape culture, masculinity, the family, the spaces where this took place,' Rau said. 'And then we followed the line of the trial and the questions it raised in society, in the media, and in people's minds.' The performance looks at the cross-examination of the accused men as well as their initial questioning by police, showing their shifting awareness of what was at stake. 'We see really what culture they're coming from, the patriarchal system, fraternity and rape culture that produces this,' Rau said. 'There was a moment of growing awareness in this city, but also in this country and in civilisation as a whole, to understand human relationships and how they have developed under a regime of capitalism, a regime of internet pornography, patriarchy, and drug-induced abuse.' The piece underlined to him how 'omnipresent' rape was in society, Rau said. A first performance took place at the Vienna festival last month, lasting seven hours, and the play will travel to other cities including Lisbon, Belgrade and Warsaw. Dècle, the play's co-writer, said: 'It's about pulling at all the threads with the audience to understand what is it that made these men – who were so different from one another – converge on that bedroom, share recipes for drugging women, suggest women close to them who should also be raped, and doing all of that while having apparently ordinary lives. It's very important what this says about our society today.' The Pelicot Trial: Tribute to Gisèle Pelicot, Avignon festival, 18 July and streamed online
France 24
16-07-2025
- Entertainment
- France 24
Our highlights from the 2025 Avignon theatre festival
07:55 Issued on: 07:55 min The Avignon theatre festival is a three-week concentration of performing arts – dance, drama, readings and debates – which is now in its 79th year. Hundreds of events are crammed into the relatively small French city, often in beautiful historical sites. And that's just the official programme. FRANCE 24's Olivia Salazar-Winspear has been filming a special show there and joins us on set to give us her personal highlights from the festival.
France 24
15-07-2025
- Entertainment
- France 24
Arabic language takes centre stage at Avignon's 79th theatre festival
Culture 12:58 12:58 min From the show For three weeks every summer, the streets of the southern French city of Avignon are overrun with performances of all kinds, from classical drama to spontaneous stand-up comedy. FRANCE 24's Olivia Salazar-Winspear went to check out this year's programme, as festival director Tiago Rodrigues invites Arabic-speaking artists to show their work as part of his guest language initiative. We discuss the multimedia storytelling of "When I saw the Sea", a performance created by Lebanese director Ali Chahrour exploring the injustices and indignities experienced by migrant workers in the "Kafala" system and hear how personal stories give his work powerful emotional authenticity and a universal resonance. We also hear from Zena, one of his inspiring actresses, and reflect upon the resistance of the Lebanese cultural sector, despite the recent crises the country has endured.
