La Scène de Bayssan presents the latest creation from Cie Le Grand Cerf bleu, “De Lumière”, on Friday January 17. A piece that takes bullfighting as its starting point to better highlight these existential questions that torment us: life, death, our childhood, our origins…
Comedian David Ayala is at the center of “Of light“, the latest creation by Jean-Baptiste Tur, from the Béziers company Le Grand Cerf bleu. The story of a young man who dreams of becoming an artist and who, shocked by the sudden death of his father, abandons his projects to create a documentary on the bullfighting world It’s about bullfighting, of course, but above all about our relationship to childhood, to our origins, to subversion and to death.
How was this project born?
Jean-Baptiste contacted me and convinced me to come back to the theater. I did it for twenty years and I felt very tired, I needed to breathe; Besides, I had a busy TV and cinema schedule. But this show speaks, in a way, about our youth. We both grew up in the South and in bullfighting towns, Arles for me and Béziers for him. We were marked by the rise and tragic destiny of Nimeno II.
Is it an autobiographical show?
Let’s say instead that this is autofiction. Jean-Baptiste invented a fiction based on our lives. I play my own role and I actually went to film and interview young bullfighters. But bullfighting is only a pretext to question youth, the taste for risk, the approach to mourning and death. Ultimately, it’s a show about people from the South.
Is this a way of dignifying bullfighting as a tradition?
No, because in any case, we come up against a lack of understanding on both sides. Pros or antis, everyone is driven by the passion of their fight. The approach is much more subtle, animated by tenderness and humor, to evoke the love for a father or a mother, the relationship with death. My character speaks to a bullhead to ask why men feel the need to face danger? Why do people risk their lives to change things? Creation is also a risk-taking, a danger…
There are many misconceptions about the bullfighting world. We are here to touch our humanity. We tell a story and we ultimately talk about life. You should absolutely not believe that this piece is reserved for aficionados. People who didn’t like bullfighting were upset by the spectacle.
You’ve been in the spotlight lately, how do you view your job?
-I’ve been doing this job for 32 years. It gave me a lot of joy but also sadness because it is sometimes difficult to face refusals. At first, I had a childlike pleasure in being in the light. Today, what matters to me is its artistic aspect: acting, writing, directing a play, directing a film. Telling stories, in fact. The advantage is that it is a collective profession, which allows talents to be brought together.
Your year 2024 has been rich. How does 2025 look?
It’s true that I have worked a lot over the last four years. There was the series “Of money and blood” by Xavier Giannoli, “Mercy” by Alain Guiraudie, “Phew love”by Gilles Lellouche (even if many of my scenes were cut) and the series “Zorro” with Jean Dujardin. At the start of the year, I continue with the 2e pane of “Kaamelott” and a participation in the film by Dominique Cabrera, with Yolande Moreau and Hélène Vincent (“Women like any other”Editor’s note).
I would sometimes like to develop stronger things, through complex roles like with Giannoli or Guiraudie. When you’re an actor, you want to play everything or, in any case, try everything. I love it when directors cast me in a role that goes against my usual image.
La Cie Biterroise Le Grand Cerf bleu
Jean-Baptiste Tur, the director of “De Lumière”, is not unknown in Béziers, where he wore out his pants as a child. It was also in the city of Riquet that he tried his hand at theater, first at the MJC then at the city’s drama conservatory. In Paris, he continued his studies in higher literature (khâgne and hypokhâgne) and philosophy, before switching definitively to the arms of the theater. With his brother Gabriel, they created the Cie Le Grand Cerf bleu, in 2014, in reference to an adventure of Arthur and Perceval hunting the Great White Deer. “The question underlying this legend is: what is man’s greatest desire? And the answer – to have a choice – seemed promising to us by opening up all possibilities”he says.
The Company, which was fortunate to be accompanied by Jean Varela, head of Sortie Ouest at the time, met a national audience in 2016, with No that’s not it (Treplev variation)audience prize at the Impatience festival. The two brothers are also the linchpins of the Les Lunes bleues festival, in the Faubourg district, which will have its 2nd this year in the spring.e edition.
“The show is inspired by both of our lives (comedian David Ayala and himself) and says how much the territory where we grew up permeates us, whether we reject it or whether it overtakes us. It’s a question in which Azilys Tanneau, with whom I wrote the show, also recognized herself.
The director continues: “The starting point is these young people, going against the tide of the times, who want to become bullfighters and are passionate about this universe. It is all the same a game with death which takes place on the ring, even if the question escapes the boundaries of the arena: how far can we go for our art? What gives meaning to life and death in a society where it has become taboo? ‘she is in the center of the track in bullfighting…”.
Jean-Baptiste Tur assures that he does not have a partisan view. “We are neither in support nor in rejection. We tell without judgment
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