Between the iron of an industrial building dating from the beginning of the 20th century and the boards of a theater created in 1947, the Comédie de Saint-Etienne is one of the great national theaters. Each season, the venue welcomes 45,000 spectators in an industrial-sized building.
In the Saint-Etienne night, the building is unmissable. On the pediment, the name of the theater is written in luminous red letters and the large hall is transformed into a giant white lantern visible from the heights of the city.
At night, the large room is covered in a luminous mantle, making it visible from very far away.
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© Mathis Merlen / FTV
Since 2017, the Comédie de Saint-Etienne has taken up residence at Place Jean Dasté, near the Zénith and the Stade Geoffroy Guichard. In the last century, there were metallurgical industries here, the building, where the National Drama Center is located today, belonged to the SSCM (Société Stéphanoise de Construction Mécanique). Here, the workers manufactured the equipment necessary for the extraction of coal in the mine, until it went into liquidation in 2004.
We still find traces of this industrial past in the structure of the building itself. As soon as you enter the immense hall of the theater, you just have to raise your head to immerse yourself in the past. Above the void, overhead cranes from the old factory were placed to serve as walkways for the technical teams. “It’s very, very old iron, older than us, smiles Thomas Chazalon, general manager of the Comédie. In Saint-Etienne, we are very attached to heritage and our history. Having this old part, which reminds us of where we come from, that touches us.”
To find another clue to this past, just open the doors of “La Stéphanoise”, a 300-seat room. “We have visible clinker walls, shows the manager. Clinker is the residue from mining work. By burning part of the “mine trash” we made buildings.”
A new building was added to the old factory to accommodate the Jean Dasté room: 700 places. On performance evenings, its exterior facades and roof light up, forming the “lantern” of the Comedy. “We have one of the largest platters in France: 25 meters from wall to wall, 16 meters deep, 18 meters under the grill [NDLR: la structure qui porte le matériel technique comme les projecteurs]we have very nice equipment which allows us to host major shows”underlines Thomas Chazalon with pride.
The move of the Comédie from the city center to the former industrial district in 2017 made it possible to bring together under the same roof the stages, the administration, the set and costume creation teams, but also the École supérieure d dramatic art, which trains future actors.
In addition to the two performance halls, the building has two 100 square meter studios and a rehearsal room almost as large as the stage of the Salle Jean Dasté. The place welcomes both plays already staged in other theaters, as well as original creations made on site. A production of pieces made possible by technical teams who can manufacture tailor-made costumes and sets and above all on site.
The Comedy is the heir of a desire for decentralization of theater that began after the Second World War. Jean Dasté, actor and director, founded one of the first national drama centers in 1947 in Saint-Etienne.
The troupe’s debut took place on the road, without a fixed venue, they brought theater to village and town squares.“In 1947 and 1948, in the public, we see the miners leaving work, describes Benoît Lambert, current director of the Comedy. It was a concrete utopia and one that came true: offering theater to people where they lived.
If today, the Comedy flourishes in a huge building, seven years after its installation, it already dreams of pushing the walls. As the school accommodates more students, more space is needed to allow them to rehearse. Indication of renewed artistic vitality in a district marked by deindustrialization, bringing the place from shadow to light.
