Marie Gicquel, edited by Loane Nader 09:58, March 21, 2023

A new play by Michel Leeb features two characters, failed actors, more incapable than each other and forced to spend a few hours together during a casting. The falsely friendly characters of the play "The pigeons" are played by Francis Huster and the screenwriter himself.

When two failed and especially rival actors find themselves in the same cast, it gives a situation that is embarrassing to say the least. This is the feeling felt by the spectators of the play "The pigeons", between two bursts of laughter in front of unconsciously childish characters. Written by Michel Leeb, the work is self-deprecating and features a great name of the Comédie-Française, Francis Huster. And to give him the answer, it is Michel Leeb himself who plays one of the two actors in search of success.

"Serge, what the are you doing here? - I'm here for the casting myself. "Oh me too!" the two main characters, Serge and Bernard, say like a game of ping-pong. Both happy and slightly disappointed to see each other in the same place for the same reason, long-time friends find it difficult to hide their disillusionment.

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A "fourth degree" play

"I didn't want us to take ourselves seriously and I didn't want the story to be taken seriously, since it's completely in the third degree. I would say in the fourth degree, even, "says the screenwriter, adept at caricature. Caught up by their frivolity, the two characters find themselves in a closed door that looks like revenge. They are then the turkeys of the stuffing, or rather the pigeons. But the dramatic strokes are numerous and the spectator does not have time to get bored.

For Francis Huster, the audience plays an important role: "There are the actors on stage, but there is also the audience who play the play. There is a direct link with the audience, who play the play at the same time as us. It's very, very amazing." The actor likes to play the play of his friend, with whom the understanding is as good on stage as backstage at the Théâtre des Nouveautés.