The offstage dramatics for this Isabelle Adjani vehicle have far outshone anything witnessed in the plush Théâtre de Paris. The show, written by Carey Perloff, opened almost three weeks late, having lost its director, Julien Collet-Vlaneck (replaced by costume designer Dominique Borg), actor Carmen Maura and its original designer (whose sets were replaced with a series of back-projected slides, mostly of a portentous moon, conceived by Adjani’s son Barnabé Nuytten). Adjani lists herself as “artistic director” in the programme, and told Le Monde that she “cannot obey” her stand-in director “if that goes against my organic evidence”. So we know who’s in charge, then.
On stage she is one part of a humdrum Freudian triangle (mother, son, son’s lover who happens to be mother’s best friend). The mother – an ageing actor, ably played by Vittoria Scognamiglio – takes a shine to an underground theatre club presenting Racine’s Phèdre. That mythical figure lurks behind the show’s pseudo-incest and Adjani’s own career – the big one that got away, the stage role she was supposed to play for director Patrice Chéreau before his death last year in Paris.
The actor’s son (known only as Lui) is an upstart journalist who wants to investigate how this underground theatre can bring life back to decimated neighbourhoods. He sells the idea to his editor (Elle, Adjani), who quickly falls for more than his pitch. Lui (played by Niels Schneider, the astonishing androgynous angel in Xavier Dolan’s film Les Amours Imaginaires) and Elle never really catch on fire. The expected conflagration when the mother finds out she’s been egging on her best friend to have sex with her son and share the dirty details is – sadly – a damp squib, the two rival women leadenly gripping opposite ends of a chaise longue as they bark at each other.
At which point, after nearly two hours of pure turkey, I would have given anything to see the normally luminous, dangerous, shapeshifting Adjani actually playing Phèdre, unleashing cathartic fury on us all.
• Until 25 January. Box office: 00 (33) 1 48 74 25 37. Venue: Théâtre de Paris.
