It is in these terms that, from the first scene, Adolphe confides in a stranger who is none other than his wife’s first husband. Far from a simple marital drama, the triangular relationship of this play, written just after Miss Julie, is constructed around the question of absolute love. The protagonists are formidably intelligent and lucid, even to the point of delirium. A fickle woman, Tekla is a fashionable writer to whom Adolphe has given everything, propelling her to success to the detriment of his own painting career. But the day of reckoning has come: the first husband knocks at the door of the present to have his revenge over the successor who stole his legitimacy and to claim his due from the one he always adored.
Anne Kessler is well acquainted with the work of the Swedish author, whom she has already worked on as a director in Grief(s), and recently as an actress in The Father. An inspired director of actors, she highlights the striking qualities of this drama, whose thriller-like plot is reminiscent of the world of Pinter. In this amorous game of cat-and-mouse, the protagonists are armed only with words and leave the depths of their souls on the battlefield.

Admittedly, August Strindberg was not staged at the Comédie-Française until the 1970s, fifty years after Ibsen, but with A Dream Play, it was one of his most original plays that entered the Repertoire. Initially it was to be directed by Ingmar Bergman, a director frequently associated with Ibsen and Strindberg, with whom he forms a trio in the theatrical imagination. However, the French language was too great an obstacle for Bergman and, in the end, the staging was entrusted to Raymond Rouleau. Ever since, every ten years or so, Strindberg, the unhappy husband, re-appeared to undermine his audience’s peace of mind and dreams of conjugal bliss. Dance of Death (1996) left no illusion in its title as to the fatal ending of the tragedy. And for the couples of The Father (1991 and 2015) and Creditors (1980 and 2018), the “struggle of minds” dramatised by Strindberg followed the same, implacable course of complex conflict, to the point of psychological murder between persecutors and persecuted, or creditors and debtors. While the couple exacerbates cruelty, it is not the only battlefield. The Ghost Sonata (1975) revealed the blackness of the characters and, in_The Stronger_, feminine rivalry proves to be formidable. This short play was staged in 2006 by Anne Kessler, who, in Grief(s), associated it with A Doll’s House (Ibsen) and The Best Intentions (Bergman).

Strindberg’s affinities with Ibsen are numerous, in particular for the dramaturgy of the family drama and conjugality, or even the violent war of the sexes dominated by the feminine insurrection and dramatic confrontation oscillating between love and hatred.

Staging: Anne Kessler
Adaptation: Guy Zilberstein
Translation: Alain Zilberstein
Scenography: Gilles Taschet
Costumes: Bernadette Villard
Lights: Éric Dumas
Sound: mme miniature