Paris (AFP)

On Wednesday, the Théâtre des Quartiers d'Ivry closed its doors. The staff was on strike against his own director, who had been raped for a year.

This is the case #MeToo French theater, while the cinema is still shaken by the business Luc Besson and especially Adele Haenel and Roman Polanski.

A hundred people gathered Wednesday night at TQI, Ivry-sur-Seine (Val-de-Marne), to call for the resignation of Jean-Pierre Baro. The latter is the subject of a complaint for rape filed in 2018 by a young woman who worked in a production office, for events that took place in September 2011, years before he took the direction of the theater.

The complaint was dismissed in March 2019 due to lack of evidence. But in a blog hosted by the site Mediapart, the theater critic Jean-Pierre Thibaudat has relaunched the case by detailing the allegations of the young woman, who says he was raped in his apartment.

The journalist also quotes the testimony of two young actresses who say they were sexually harassed by Mr. Baro.

In a statement sent Thursday to AFP, the director said he "formally denied all charges against him, which are conveyed by a defamatory campaign of exceptional violence."

Assured to have "the greatest respect for the liberation of the word of women", he specifies that he "can not allow to trample on the presumption of innocence to which he is entitled like any citizen".

The TQI team, it says to be exhausted.

- "The public deserts our rooms" -

"The public deserts our rooms Many artists refuse to set foot in the theater or have to deal with its direction Territorial partners disengage," said the staff in a statement Wednesday, referring to a "catastrophic" situation, in a theater that "collapses little by little".

"If he is attached to the theater, Jean-Pierre Baro must resign," said AFP a representative of staff who requested anonymity.

The institution "can not survive in these conditions," he says. One director, Myriam Saduis, and the collective Eskandar, both withdrew from the program, he said, and at least three members of the team slammed the door.

According to the same representative, a piece made by Mr. Baro in November at the theater was only 23% filled. Worse, "school bookings have totally dropped this year."

- "Popular Vindicte" -

The staff call the powers of guardianship to react, because it is the "survival" of the establishment.

Contacted by AFP on Thursday, the Ministry of Culture said it had "proposed to Mr. Baro to work on two axes: how to put his theater back on track and how does he take into account the suffering of the team?"

"We are still in discussion," the ministry said.

Director of several pieces, Mr. Baro was appointed by the former Minister of Culture Françoise Nyssen in June 2018.

"Ten days before taking office in January, we learn that he was targeted by a rape case.It was hard enough to cash and it did not bode well," said the staff representative.

The fact that Mr. Baro was "quite absent, had no experience directing a theater and wanted to change everything," exacerbated the tension.

The director has attached a second, signed by 56 women and men who denounce a "popular mistrust" and believe that "the portrait of criminal sex abusing his power does not correspond to the person we know."

© 2019 AFP