Paris (AFP)

Political theater is notoriously dominated by men's roles, but for the first time, the Comédie-Française is one of Shakespeare's most "masculine" plays.

Unlike theaters across the Channel, women in France rarely play major classical roles reserved for actors - Maria Casares in the title role of King Lear in 1993, three years before his death, is one of the exceptions.

In "Jules Caesar" (Théâtre du Vieux-Colombier, until November 3), a piece that best embodies the ambitions of men in power, Martine Chevallier faces the "Cassius" Clothilde Bayser, or "Marc Antoine from Georgia Scalliet.

"This is an opportunity to offer actresses a score to which they usually do not have access," says AFP Rodolphe Dana, who signs his first staging for the "House of Molière".

In Shakespeare's time, women were not allowed to perform on stage and men even played women's roles (the number of Shakespearian male roles is seven times that of women).

Reducing the number of characters in this tragedy published in 1623 from 40 to ten roles, equally divided between actors and actresses, Rodolphe Dana, who opted for a very refined staging without decor or costumes, assumes the "contemporary echo" that he wanted to give to the play because of the growing number of women in power.

- "Less convened on the directory" -

But initially, a "Julius Caesar" feminine is not for him a question of parity.

"Tyranny, despotism, political intrigue are not necessarily gender issues, and when you put your foot in politics, gender becomes secondary," he says.

The question posed by Julius Caesar, who ends historically, and in the play, murdered by a group of conspirators including his son Brutus, is "how far do we need a man or a woman? providential + on time we are witnessing a return of populism, "says the director.

The "travesty" in this piece did not fail to provoke both admiration and irritation.

"I've heard comments from people who said they wanted to see men in those roles," says Dana.

Martine Chevallier, she received congratulations from women in the audience. "I was told: + thanks to you, beautiful men's roles can be played by women," she told AFP.

Asked if assuming the role of a man was an additional difficulty, she insists: "Not at all, that's the theater, that's what the theater demands, do not be afraid".

For Eric Ruf, general director of the Comédie-Française, it is first "to give interesting and complex roles to women who are less convened on the repertoire", although in appearance, the major titles-roles feminine like Berenice, Phedre, Andromache, or Iphigenia are not lacking.

"Beyond parity, it's theatrically very fertile, it reveals something else in actors and actresses," he says. "In Clothilde, for example, I saw a sort of rage develop in her that I did not know her, she was probably free of female representation in the theater".

"Some people wonder what's good for what, if the role is beautifully interpreted by a man or a woman, that's enough," says Ruf.

The deputy head of one of the most prestigious theater companies in the world, which has been formed mainly by professors like Madeleine Marion, Catherine Hiegel and Josephine Derenne, has been trying to move the lines since the beginning of his mandate in 2014, with a very large number of directors engaged under her mandate, like Julie Deliquet, Chloé Dabert or Maëlle Poésy.

But he intends to pursue this change in an organic way.

"In the Anglo-Saxon countries, there is this desire for quotas greater than in France," he says.

"Ten years ago, I would not have asked myself the question of parity, in 10 years, I would not ask myself more.I am of my time and one is obliged to think about it".

© 2019 AFP