PHOTO by Eric Labbé
Sadler’s Wells (London, Great Britain ) in association with Ex Machina (Quebek, Canada) & Sylvie Guillem
EONNAGATA
Written and performed by Sylvie Guillem, Robert Lepage, Russell Maliphant
Presented with the support of Rolex
Lighting Designer - Michael Hulls
Costume Designer - Alexander McQueen
Sound Designer – Jean-Sebastien Côté
Assistant Director / Stage Manager – Félix Dagenais
Technical Director / Head Stagehand – Eric Gautron
Production / Tour Manager – Eric Gingras
Musical score:
Georg Muffat, Antonio Soler, The Legend of the Twelve Thieves – Russian Folk Song, Oscar Ruben Bohorquez, Joseph Boulogne Chevalier St-Georges, Karl King, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Johann Sebastian Bach
June 9, 10, 11
Venue: Mossovet Theatre
Duration 1 h 30 min without intermission
Eonnagata tells the strange tale of Chevalier d’Eon, the French diplomat, swordsman and spy whose cross-dressing and ambiguous sexuality was a source of 18th century intrigue. He/she provided then, and provides now, an uneasy reminder of what we are and what we feel, be we men, maids, or sexualities in between.
Sarah Frater, Evening Standard (March 3, 2009)
The work has been put together by four very different, and internationally acclaimed, artists: there’s Lepage, the choreographer Russell Maliphant, the dancer Sylvie Guillem and the fashion designer Alexander McQueen. That’s quite a team - and the result is a unique hybrid of their art forms. How would they describe it? Maliphant gives it a go: “It’s not pure dance: it doesn’t have Sylvie doing splits or amazing falls. But it’s not pure theatre, either.”
Judith Mackrell, The Guardian (February, 19, 2009)
Most extraordinary is the moment where the elderly Chevalier conjures up his former selves and Guillem and Maliphant, summoning their own most astonishing technical virtuosity, dance a mirror duet before seeming to physically slither, dissolve and vanish from sight. The Chevalier is left alone to die, splayed out on the autopsy table, as a single beam of light rakes cruelly over his body. It is a heart-rending scene and one of several moments that confirm there is a character in the middle of this complicated production with the power to fascinate and move. But Eonnagata still feels like a work in progress, and its character hasn’t yet come into focus.
Judith Mackrell, The Guardian (March, 3, 2009)
“Eonnagata is neither a dance, nor a theatre, or immersion in human psyche. It is the
combination of the three.
There are three of them on stage. The three of them created this unique and continually
evolving performance. Its fragility conveys the refined changeability of the bodies, the
states of mind and the reality. For the first time in her career Sylvie Guillem collaborated
with drama and opera director Robert Lepage. Working with them was her brilliant partner
Russel Maliphant whose dancing techniques always combined power and fineness.
These two inspired performers dissolve in Robert Lepage’s experimental drama. The director from Quebec, the poet of the stage, the magician of imagery, he is no doubt today’s
greatest man of theatre in the broadest sense of the word. Lepage is a genius and we use
this word absolutely consciously (…).
This performance blends together the solemnity of a religious rite and elegant acting style.
It combines the narrative with acting and dance. And distinctive elusiveness is always
present in it. The reverie. The unexpectedness. And all this blows away like a tender and
sad dream”.
Figaro
“The work has been put together by four very different, and internationally acclaimed, artists: there’s Lepage, the choreographer Russell Maliphant, the dancer Sylvie Guillem and the fashion designer Alexander McQueen. That’s quite
a team - and the result is a unique hybrid of their art forms. How would they describe it? Maliphant gives it a go: ‘It’s not pure dance: it doesn’t
have Sylvie doing splits or amazing falls. But it’s not pure theatre, either’.”
The Guardian
“Constantly surprising, Eonnagata is a caress rather than a knock-out blow. It is pure artistry and gives new meaning to the term moving pictures”
The Stage
Producer for Ex Machina Michel Bernatchez. Production Assistants Vanessa Landry-Claverie & Marie-Pierre Gagné
Sadler’s Wells London: Chief Executive / Artistic Director Alistair Spalding. Director of Programming Suzanne Walker. Programming Manager Mai Komoriya. Projects Manager Charlotte Geeves.
Coproducers Festival TransAmériques – Montreal. Spielzeit’europa – Berliner Festspiele.
Special thanks to: Alexander McQueen’s Team, Jean-Marc Cyr’s Team, Guy Fortin, Ian Roseberry, Thomy Brière, Marija Djordjevic, Martin Beausoleil, Pascal Tremblay, Michael Mackenzie, Gilles Tapie, Oliver Chanut
and the Centre for 19th Century French Studies at the University of Toronto.
Ex Machina is funded by the Canada Council for the Arts, Quebec’s Arts and Literature Council and the City of Quebec.
