There is certainly nice guy at Bruno Solothe debonair air, the obvious benevolence that emerges from his gaze, a nature that we guess is good and that Catherine Schaub astutely puts to good use in her dramatized reading of “Dinner”, based on the novel by the Dutchman Herman Koch which Jean-Benoît Patricot adapts into a monologue, until December 1st at the theater of the Workshop (Paris 18th century). This dinner in a gourmet restaurant during which the future of a family will be decided, torn apart…
If it is a monologue, the actor is not completely alone on stage. At his side, a guitarist – Laurent Guillet or Édouard Demanche – performs live the soundtrack of this evening, from the ambient notes in this upscale restaurant to the more stressful ones of the horror story that we are told, in parallel from that of the meal, Paul, the narrator. That evening, therefore, he is with Claire, his wife. They have an appointment with his brother Serge and Babeth, his wife. They have to talk about what their respective sons, Rick and Michel, did.
A butler who constantly interrupts the conversation
During a recent evening, the cousins committed the irreparable. Under the lens of a surveillance camera. If the video images are broadcast on the networks and are shown on all the TVs, only their parents recognized them. What to do with this? The question arises all the more as Serge is about to become the future Prime Minister of the Netherlands…
Here is the difficult agenda for this dinner which will only be discussed at the end of the meal. Difficult to tackle it. Especially since the conversation is constantly interrupted by the establishment’s pinched maître d’ – the guitarist – who pompously announces the dishes, annoying the guests who are already on edge.
Guests that Bruno Solo, with the text before his eyes, embodies all in turn with dexterity. Sitting at the table set up in the center of the stage, he is calm and straight, portraying the narrator, a loving father devastated by what his little angel was able to do. Where the world is going, the question arises… He, embodies right-thinking, constantly gets up to go smoke and avoid this annoying subject, not hesitating to slander his brother, a savvy politician, arriviste, an upstart without taste nor culture displaying its wealth…
The story is tense, chilling, breathtaking
This brother, he is dictatorial and authoritarian, fatter too. Almost handsome. Babeth doesn’t speak. Claire, a little, a woman who refuses the obvious but tries to stand up. The story is tense, chilling, breathtaking. Small touches of humor allow us to breathe so little before plunging back into this unbreathable situation. The subject is finally addressed at dessert, head on, with this question: how far to go to protect your children?
Faced with this gripping, heavy story, we remain suspended on the lips of the actor. In his gaze, fleeting, lost or piercing. He keeps the audience in suspense, convincingly embodies the protagonists of this sad affair. And at the time of choice, when it comes to conclusion and when everything changes, the storyteller takes us with him. With all the good nature and roundness that characterizes him. Even more frightening…
“Dinner”, at the Théâtre de l’Atelier (Paris 18th century), until December 1, Friday and Saturday at 7 p.m., Sunday at 6 p.m. From 1 to 38 euros.