Beijing News (reporter Liu Zhen) Recently, with the support of the French Embassy in China, the "new live" screening brand of Beijing Ogvi Cultural Communication Co., Ltd. launched the "High-definition Video Screening Season for the 400th Anniversary of Molière's Birth", and in the next year, there will be four plays that are being staged in France, "Moaning Without Disease", "Miserly Ghost", "Hypocrites" and "Haters of the World", which will be screened in the form of high-definition images in Beijing, Xi'an, Chengdu, Guangzhou and other places.
Stills from "Moaning Without Illness". New site courtesy of the picture
2022 marks the 400th anniversary of the birth of Molière, the famous 17th-century French playwright and creator of classical comedy, and "The Hypocrite" and "The Miser" are all new and rearranged works for the 400th anniversary of birth. The Hypocrite is directed by the famous European director Ivo van Hove, who runs the Amsterdam Theatre Company in the Netherlands, who specializes in pioneering and subversive contemporary adaptations of the classic, and this time he will return to the original version of The Hypocrite, which was performed only once on the day of its premiere in 1664. "Miserly" is a perfect combination of genre comedy and character comedy, after the female director of George Fedo's "True and False Peach Blossom" Lilo Ball Youshan handled such a story exquisitely playful and funny. The Haters is a 2017 version of director Clement Elevius-Leger's recapitulation that is more critical of high-society hypocrisy and whimsy. The premiere of this commemorative season, Moaning Without Illness, is Molière's last work and one of his most brilliant satirical comedies, and Claude Stratz's rehearsed version has been staged more than 500 times, in which the discussion of disease and medicine will particularly trigger people's thinking today.
It is understood that as early as the beginning of the last century, Li Jianwu, Zhao Shaohou and other translators of the older generation translated Molière's works, and his vivid and spicy social customs paintings also left a deep impression on Chinese readers, but such a concentrated performance of his stage works is unprecedented. It is worth mentioning that the rearrangement and performance lineup of the four plays are from the French Comedie Academy, which has a deep relationship with Molière. As one of the oldest surviving national theatres in the world, the Comémily-française was founded by Louis XIV to commemorate the death of Molière in his prime, embodying the spiritual legacy of the master who did not appear. In 2018, "New Scene" landed the high-definition image brand of the Comedy française in China through THE EMI scene, and has so far screened many works such as "Big Nose Love" and "True and False Peach Blossom". Tan Kaili, Cultural Commissioner of the Pop Music and Film and Television Department of the French Embassy in China, said that Molière occupies a very important position in the history of European theater, and to some extent represents the "French spirit", especially in the world epidemic environment, the form of theatrical images has created an excellent opportunity for cultural exchanges between the two countries to enhance mutual understanding.
Beijing News reporter Liu Zhen
Edited by Tian Kaini Proofread by Chen Diyan