Disturbed by two years of Covid, the Festival d'Avignon, which will close its 76th edition in a few days, has returned to its usual programming this year. Its director since 2014, director Olivier Py, also signs its latest edition. On the eve of bidding farewell, the man of theater fond of politics entrusts us with his memories and impressions.  

La French Touch: In this particularly uncertain current context, can we expect light and hope from this 76th edition of the Festival d'Avignon?  

Olivier Py: Even the most desperate theater and the most attached to radical lucidity still brings hope. It is a paradox of art in general and of theater in particular. When a curtain rises, it's a miracle. Of course, this miracle does not answer all the questions we ask ourselves about the state of the world, but it does create, for a time, a community of minds capable of giving us courage in the battles we have to fight. I am like you, I have the certainty that there will be, for the generations to come, fights without precedent in the history of humanity. Does this edition bear witness to that? Yes, because artists are open to the suffering of their brothers, to the big questions as well as to the intimate questions that are crossed by the great story.  

LFT: Why did you choose “Once upon a time” as the theme for 2022? 

OP: Firstly because it's my last edition: I would like to finish as if it were a beginning – and it obviously is… Also because the role of the narrative seems important to me. Look, for example, in the Ukrainian crisis, we are witnessing a narrative war between Putin's camp and Ukraine. So is creating Europe: it is not only a question of ideologies and economic interests, but also of common narratives. The theater carries this dimension, and in the dark days that we are going through, it can be effective.  

"We believe the Avignon Festival is indestructible when in reality it is very fragile"  

LFT: On a more personal level, how did you leave this direction? 

OP: It's heartbreaking for me to such an extent that I had trouble imagining a sequel, whatever it might be. I have dedicated my life to the Festival for ten years. It will also be heartbreaking to leave the city of Avignon to which I am extremely attached. I am consoled in this adventure by leaving the house to Tiago Rodriguez (the Portuguese director's note) whom I admire and respect. I will join the group of former directors who still watch over the Festival. We believe the Festival d'Avignon is indestructible when in reality it is very fragile. It can be destabilized by a small political reversal or even, as we have seen, by a virus...  

LFT: If you had to entrust us with a happy moment during this period? 

OP: There are so many, with 500 shows and 3 curtain raisers! There is also everything that is not part of the program: meetings, discussions late at night, debates on ideas, moments of excitement with the artists and the Festival teams... So it's infinite of course. On a personal level, I succeeded for three years in a row in allowing inmates of the Pontet prison to perform for the Festival audience. A huge memory. Because when we started rehearsing with these boys in Avignon, some hadn't been out of prison for ten years. It is a very moving memory.  

"There are several ways to ensure that the theater is not an object of consumption, nor a simple entertainment" 

LFT: This year you are directing the play My exalted youth, the story of a contemporary Harlequin, this poor character dressed in a patched costume who embodies wisdom through humor in literature. What fate do you offer him?  

OP: I have remained faithful to his myth, which has survived the centuries. There are few equivalents in the theater of a character who finds his place both in the XVIIe, XVIIIe, XIXe century then back to the XXe then finally also in the XXIe century. You are right to say that he is poor: he embodies the bottom of the ladder. In my play, he's a pizza delivery guy. I obviously thought of the workers at Amazon and Deliveroo who find themselves below working conditions with almost no rights at times. Yet Harlequin, through his youth, his beauty, his humour, his intelligence and his thirst for life, manages to reverse the violence of power and teach it a lesson. 

LFT: This piece also lasts ten hours. Is this a way for you to slow down the time you often seem to miss? 

OP: Yes, that's true. And it is a paradox. Because Harlequin always goes faster than the world. I believe that this long duration offers spectators a requirement. They are asked for more than during the usual catharsis of an hour and a half or two hours. In a play, beyond a duration of five hours, something else necessarily happens. Also, the generation playing this play is less frightened than its elders at the idea of ​​having to go through this kind of story. They have an affinity with long works, if only because of the series that are part of their era. 

LFT: We see more and more long-term pieces coming up. Getting out of the frame, would this be the new adventure of the theater?  

OP: But the theater is a setting! And we can also get out of the box with a ten hour piece! There are several ways to ensure that the theater is not an object of consumption or a simple entertainment. That it calls through its unfolding for the spectator to feel a little more citizen and sometimes a little more mortal… It's magic. Myself, the more I advance the less I know how it works. But I know it works. And the length is one of the ways of unframing the frame.  

“We have almost reached parity over the last two editions” 

LFT: Let's talk about your fights. This year, the place of women will be one of the subjects of the Festival. In what terms is the feminization of theater in Avignon posed? 

OP: First of all, we had to move towards parity. It was not won when I started, despite all the good will of my teams. From year to year, the proportion of female directors, choreographers and project leaders has increased and we have practically reached parity over the last two editions. While taking into account the fact that it is the quality of the shows that mattered to us first and that there should be no positive discrimination. Although it is difficult, in truth, not to do so... Then, I don't ask women, when they come to Avignon, to necessarily talk about female condition. The question of the new feminism – what it could mean in the struggle against capitalism – I found very present in many artists. This year, we are hosting a Palestinian show, directed by a man who only talks about the condition of women, and especially women during the war. The question of being a mother in the war is very present this year.  

LFT: What about your other favorite subjects?  

OP: We've done a lot of fighting editions… I've even been criticized for that a lot, but I always try to make myself proud of what I'm being blamed for. We fought for culture and theatre, for LGBT rights, for certain countries, the prison condition, migrants... The Festival d'Avignon has become a place where certain fights can, throughout the month of July, take place. express freely intelligently and dialectically too. I'm proud of it.  

LFT: After the cancellation of the Festival in 2020 and a reduced 2021 to a bare minimum, 2022 marks a return to "normal". We know, however, that this is not the case, starting with the situation of artists. How are these post-covid changes expressed in Avignon? 

OP: In any case, they don't say much about attendance! I am a happy director. In mid-June (this interview was carried out at the end of June, editor's note) the booking figures were the same as during the previous edition. The public demonstrates a commitment and a loyalty that is undeniable even in difficult times.  

LFT: To come back to the various current debates: why, unlike contemporary art, does the theater take up so little of the ecological question and the defense of the living? 

OP: I've often asked myself this question and I'm not sure I have the answer. Unlike the visual arts, we don't need to go to the living because we are! We are certainly missing a Guiseppe Penone who brings the cause of nature back to the sets, even if Anne-Cécile Vandalem has quite fulfilled this imperative duty with these last three shows (sadness in 2016, Arctic in 2019, Kingdom in 2021 Ed). When the theater only deals with a single subject, it is often bad theatre… Shakespeare does not talk about death, desire and politics, he manages to make these themes intersect, respond to each other and dialogue . The shows that manage to link feminism, conscious anti-capitalism, the state of the Earth and the violence of the commercial world are, in my opinion, more interesting than yet another press article on ecology.  

"Reducing the energy expenditure of shows costs money" 

LFT: Can we imagine a zero-carbon Festival?  

OP: On these issues, such as those of transport and paper consumption, the Festival has evolved a lot in ten years by favoring, for example, the digitization of tickets and programs. But the Festival is not alone. There are behaviors that we have imposed by working with eco-responsible companies. Finally, reduce the energy expenditure of the shows costs money, but the Festival is poor, but we are going gradually, by generalizing the use of LEDs for example...  

LFT: You who are crazy about the stage, would you like to create a piece in the Metaverse?  

OP: Due to the violence of the Covid, we had to develop streaming and then above all put online extraordinary archives that were not known. However, the theater is radically opposed to the Metavers. And besides, my little Harlequin forces himself to remember that we don't live in the Metavers. We pretend. He also recalls that capitalism is a falsification of life and that it makes profits on the falsification of reality. The Metavers is a great danger for the psychic health of humanity.