Marie Brassard
Marie Brassard is a Canadian actress,[1] theatrical writer and director. She is known for her work with playwright and actor Robert Lepage[2] and later for her own French and English theatrical pieces, which have been presented in many countries in the Americas, Europe and in Australia.
Career
Brassard performed and co-created with Lepage between the years 1985 and 2000 in theatre (The Dragons’ Trilogy,[3] Polygraph,[4] The Seven Streams of the River Ota, The Shakespeare Trilogy: Coriolanus, The Tempest and Macbeth) and in films ( Polygraph, NÔ ).[5] In 2001, she created her first solo play, Jimmy, within the framework of the Festival TransAmériques.
The success of the play led Brassard to found her own production company, Infrarouge, and to begin to work solo.[6] Since then, in collaboration with guest artists from different disciplines and origins, she has created surrealist theatre with and innovative video, light and sound installations, including The Darkness (2003), Peepshow (2005), The Glass Eye (2007), The Invisible (2008), Me Talking to Myself in the Future (2010) and Trieste (2013).
Brassard's plays have been performed at the Théâtre de l’Odéon in Paris, The Studio at the Sydney Opera in Australia, the Barbican Centre in London UK, the Haus der Berliner Festspiele and the Sophiensaele in Berlin, the Halle G im Museums Quartier and Brut im Künstlerhaus in Vienna, the Kulturhuset in Stockholm, The Malthouse, Merlyn Theatre in Melbourne and Le Teatro de La Abadia in Madrid.
In 2013, she created a collage of texts by Nelly Arcan and staged the piece, titled in French La Fureur de ce que je pense (The Fury of my Thoughts) at Espace Go in Montreal. Her play Peepshow was restaged actress Monia Chokri as the protagonist. She then began a residency at the Montevideo centre in Marseille.
Later in her career, Brassard began working as a dance dramaturge and director. She created two dance pieces in collaboration with dancer choreographer Sarah Williams: Moving in this World (2014), developed in residency in Potsdam, was presented in Montreal, Potsdam and in Madrid, and States of Transe (2013). Brassard also choreographed several short pieces in collaboration with a number of choreographers. She danced in two Isabelle Van Grimde pieces (Perspectives Montreal and The Bodies in Question).
Brassard has appeared in a number of films, including those by Robert Lepage, Michael Winterbottom, Guy Maddin, Ryan McKenna, Denis Côté, Sophie Deraspe et Stéphane Lafleur. In 2017 the film Nelly, choreographed by Brassard, was shown at Montreal’s Festival TransAmériques.[7]
She was recently awarded L'Ordre des arts et des lettres du Québec.
Plays
- 2015: Peepshow (2015)
- 2014: The Darkness, revisited
- 2013: La Fureur de ce que je pense
- 2013: Trieste
- 2010: Me talking to Myself in the Future
- 2008: The Invisible
- 2007: The Glass Eye
- 2005: Peepshow
- 2003: The Darkness
- 2001: Jimmy
Film appearances
- 1997: Polygraph (Le Polygraphe)
- 1998: Nô
- 2000: The Claim
- 2001: La Loi du cochon
- 2002: Past Perfect
- 2004: Le Bonheur c'est une chanson triste
- 2006: Congorama
- 2007: Continental, a Film Without Guns (Continental, un film sans fusil)
- 2008: Babine
- 2008: Cadavres
- 2009: Les grandes chaleurs
- 2009: Vital Signs (Les signes vitaux)
- 2013: Vic and Flo Saw a Bear
- 2014: Roberta
- 2015: Corbo
References
- ^ Histoire du théâtre au Canada. Graduate Centre for Study of Drama, University of Toronto; 1990. p. 158.
- ^ New York Times. The New York Times Theater Reviews 1997-1998. Psychology Press; 2 January 2001. ISBN 978-0-8153-3341-8. p. 274–.
- ^ London Theatre Record. Vol. 11, Issues 14-26. I. Herbert; 1991. p. 1410.
- ^ Jerry Wasserman. Modern Canadian plays. Talonbooks; 1 July 2001. ISBN 978-0-88922-437-7. p. 70.
- ^ Theater Week. Vol. 10, Issues 14-22. That New Magazine, Incorporated; 1996. p. 18.
- ^ "Actresses go in search of Nelly Arcan at Festival TransAmériques". Jim Burke, Montreal Gazette, May 25, 2017,
- ^ "Shows at Montreal’s Festival TransAmériques explore memory from radically different angles". The Globe and Mail, Robert Everett-Green, MONTREAL May 29, 2017
External links
- Infrarouge, Marie Brassard's Production Company
- Marie Brassard at IMDb
- "Marie Brassard". The Canadian Encyclopedia.
