Is telling your own story really acting?

Nini and Pascal are a couple. She is a director, he a playwright; neither is an actor. Ten years ago, after living only two weeks, their daughter died quietly in their arms. They are onstage now to talk about it. What are the limits to privacy and intimacy? Just how much intimacy can be presented onstage? These are the questions that Nini and Pascal asked when creating Beauté, chaleur et mort (Beauty, Warmth and Death), the second production by Projet MÛ.

The piece provides an in-depth examination of a couple in the depths of mourning and grief. Nini and Pascal return to that tragic event to dissect their state of post-traumatic stress. What does one do, how does one behave in the minutes, hours and days following the death of an infant? What to say, and how to say it? And how, ten years after the fact, should it be presented onstage?

Beauté, chaleur et mort is about a difficult loss but it is also, and above all, a courageous, vibrant work that is both a testimonial and an interrogation on the very frontiers of theatre. Nini and Pascal stand on the stage, talking to you. You look at them, they accept your gaze, a moment is shared, they look back at you. Rarely has theatre been so close to life.

MORAL
LISTEN, COME NEAR, LET ME WHISPER IN YOUR EAR
WHAT LIES WITHIN THE HEART OF EVERY CREATOR.
HIDDEN DEEP INSIDE ARE THOUSANDS OF LUMINOUS IDEAS
OF EVERY HUE AND EVERY SCENT,
WHERE MAGICAL WORDS BLOOM,
TENDER AND ALIVE, TO PRESERVE A FLOWER
FROM DYING AND FADING FOREVER...

Le Projet Projet MÛ consists of Nini Bélanger and Pascal Brullemans (Isberg, Hippocampe, Comment vous plairait-il?). Its mission is to explore avenues of contemporary theatre in pursuit of three objectives – create movement, shake up the spectator and become an element of change by means of cycles. These cycles can take the shape of a diptych or a triptych, as was the case for the company’s first piece, a three-part work.

In 2005 Projet MÛ began its “Endormi(e)” cycle with Les belles endormies, an adaptation of the novel by the same name by Yasunari Kawabata. In 2008 it produced
Endormi(e)s as a performance and photo exhibit. The company also presented Endormi(e) in a private home in a free adaptation of the Kawabata novel by Pascal Brullemans that was directed by Nini Bélanger. The piece was remounted at Théâtre La Chapelle the following year. The cycle “of loss” is a diptych that explores the theme of the death of a child. Beauté, chaleur et mort was presented at Théâtre La Chapelle in January 2011, and the show in Ottawa will mark the second presentation of the work. The first version of Vipérine was a staged reading in September 2010. It is currently being workshopped with the aim of a production in autumn 2012. The two Projet MÛ pieces staged to date received a Cochon d’or award at the Cartes Premières gala.

“While the piece shows that parents never forget the death of a child, it is also proof that they shoulder on, sometimes fairly well.”
Alexandre Vigneault, La Presse

Conceived and performed by
NINI BÉLANGER
PASCAL BRULLEMANS

Assistant Director
MANON CLAVEAU

Stage Design
JULIE VALLÉE-LÉGER

Lightning Design
DAVID-ALEXANDRE CHABOT

Sound Design
NICOLAS LETARTE

Control Room
MAUDE LABONTÉ

Technical Director
CHARLES MAHER

Art Advisers
DOMINIQUE PÉTIN
BENOÎT VERMEULEN

Produced by
Projet MÛ

Presented in collaboration with
Radio-Canada

Length
1 hour 25 minutes with no intermission

NAC STUDIO
53 Elgin, Ottawa

Tickets
Adults: $34.98
Students: $18.99
Live Rush: $12

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