Antoine Vitez (; 20 December 1930 – 30 April 1990) was a French actor, director, and poet. He became a central character and influence on the French theater in the post-war period, especially in the technique of teaching drama. He was also translator of
Chekhov
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (; 29 January 1860 Old Style date 17 January. – 15 July 1904 Old Style date 2 July.) was a Russian playwright and short-story writer who is considered to be one of the greatest writers of all time. His career ...
,
Vladimir Mayakovsky
Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky (, ; rus, Влади́мир Влади́мирович Маяко́вский, , vlɐˈdʲimʲɪr vlɐˈdʲimʲɪrəvʲɪtɕ məjɪˈkofskʲɪj, Ru-Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky.ogg, links=y; – 14 Apr ...
and
Mikhail Sholokhov
Mikhail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov ( rus, Михаил Александрович Шолохов, p=ˈʂoləxəf; – 21 February 1984) was a Russian novelist and winner of the 1965 Nobel Prize in Literature. He is known for writing about life ...
.
Early life
Antoine Vitez was born in Paris and trained to be an actor, finding his first acting job at the age of 19 in ''Ils attendent Lefty'' at the Théâtre Maubel. He failed to enter the
National Conservatory of Dramatic Art in Paris and became a Communist activist, which he continued until 1979, when he left the Communist Party following the invasion of
Afghanistan
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...
by the USSR.
He met
Louis Aragon
Louis Aragon (, , 3 October 1897 – 24 December 1982) was a French poet who was one of the leading voices of the surrealist movement in France. He co-founded with André Breton and Philippe Soupault the surrealist review ''Littérature''. He wa ...
in 1958 and became his private secretary from 1960 to 1962. He worked in the theater Balachova Tania, and wrote reviews published by
Jean Vilar
Jean Vilar (25 March 1912– 28 May 1971) was a French actor and theatre director.
Vilar trained under actor and theatre director Charles Dullin, then toured with an acting company throughout France. His directorial career began in 1943 in a sma ...
in the magazine ''Théâtre populaire''. Vitez also found work reading on the radio and voice-dubbing in films. He had his first opportunity as director with Sophocles' ''Electra'' at the Maison de la Culture de Caen in 1966.
Career
Vitez' production of ''Electra'' was successful and he continued directing with
Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...
n and Greek repertoire, directing
Mayakovsky
Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky (, ; rus, Влади́мир Влади́мирович Маяко́вский, , vlɐˈdʲimʲɪr vlɐˈdʲimʲɪrəvʲɪtɕ məjɪˈkofskʲɪj, Ru-Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky.ogg, links=y; – 14 Apr ...
's ''Les Bains'' in 1967,
Eugene Schwartz's ''Le Dragon'' in 1968, and
Chekhov
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (; 29 January 1860 Old Style date 17 January. – 15 July 1904 Old Style date 2 July.) was a Russian playwright and short-story writer who is considered to be one of the greatest writers of all time. His career ...
's ''La Mouette'' in 1970. After this initial period, he began working more with French and German repertoire, directing works by
Racine
Jean-Baptiste Racine ( , ) (; 22 December 163921 April 1699) was a French dramatist, one of the three great playwrights of 17th-century France, along with Molière and Corneille as well as an important literary figure in the Western traditio ...
,
Jakob Lenz
Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz (23 January 1751, or 12 January in the Julian calendar – 4 June 1792, or 24 May in the Julian calendar) was a Baltic German writer of the ''Sturm und Drang'' movement.
Life
Lenz was born in Sesswegen (Cesvaine), ...
,
Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German poet, playwright, novelist, scientist, statesman, theatre director, and critic. His works include plays, poetry, literature, and aesthetic criticism, as well as treat ...
,
Brecht
Eugen Berthold Friedrich Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956), known professionally as Bertolt Brecht, was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. Coming of age during the Weimar Republic, he had his first successes as a pl ...
and
René Kalisky
René Kalisky (; born Kaliski, ; 20 July 1936 – 6 May 1981) was a Belgian writer of Polish-Jewish descent who is best known for the plays he wrote in the last 12 years of his life.
Kalisky, whose father, Abraham Kaliski was killed at Auschwitz, ...
. He later expanded his work to both traditional and classical theatrical repertoire, including
Sophocles
Sophocles (; grc, Σοφοκλῆς, , Sophoklễs; 497/6 – winter 406/5 BC)Sommerstein (2002), p. 41. is one of three ancient Greek tragedians, at least one of whose plays has survived in full. His first plays were written later than, or co ...
,
Shakespeare
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
,
Molière
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin (, ; 15 January 1622 (baptised) – 17 February 1673), known by his stage name Molière (, , ), was a French playwright, actor, and poet, widely regarded as one of the greatest writers in the French language and world ...
,
Marivaux
Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux (4 February 1688 – 12 February 1763), commonly referred to as Marivaux, was a French playwright and novelist.
He is considered one of the most important French playwrights of the 18th century, writing nume ...
,
Paul Claudel
Paul Claudel (; 6 August 1868 – 23 February 1955) was a French poet, dramatist and diplomat, and the younger brother of the sculptor Camille Claudel. He was most famous for his verse dramas, which often convey his devout Catholicism.
Early lif ...
,
Vladimir Mayakovsky
Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky (, ; rus, Влади́мир Влади́мирович Маяко́вский, , vlɐˈdʲimʲɪr vlɐˈdʲimʲɪrəvʲɪtɕ məjɪˈkofskʲɪj, Ru-Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky.ogg, links=y; – 14 Apr ...
,
Pierre Guyotat
Pierre Guyotat (9 January 1940 – 7 February 2020) was a French writer.
Early life
Pierre Guyotat was born on 9 January 1940 in Bourg-Argental, Loire.
Literary career 1960s–1970s
Guyotat wrote his first novel, '' Sur un cheval'', in 1960. ...
,
Jean Metellus
Jean Metellus (30 April 1937 - 4 January 2014) was a Haitian neurologist, poet, novelist and playwright.
Life and career
Jean Metellus was born in Jacmel, Haiti. After completing his education in Haiti, he worked as a teacher. In 1959 he moved ...
and
Jean Audureau.
Vitez became a professor at the National Conservatory of Dramatic Arts in 1968, and in 1972 he founded the Théâtre des Quartiers d'Ivry. In the same year, he founded the Ateliers d'Ivry workshop, where amateurs and professionals could share a common theatrical practice. He became director at the Chaillot National Theatre in 1981, and was appointed deputy head of the Comédie-French in June 1988, a post he held until his sudden death in Paris in 1990.
[ In 1978, Vitez' workshop sessions were recorded by film-maker ]Maria Koleva
Maria Koleva ( Bulgarian: ''Мария Колева'', born 2 October 1940) is a Bulgarian writer and independent film-maker who lives and works in France. Koleva is also credited as a producer, film-editor and cinematographer.
Life and career ...
, who made five films on different workshop sessions.
Aesthetic
Vitez often presented his plays in locations with non-theatrical elements and without any descriptive function, employing an aesthetic of "free play" and "association of ideas," according to Georges Banu. Vitez' work required thought on the part of the audience, more than the reality of a set. He saw the theater as a "force field" and demanded an "elitist theater for all." He defended the great classical texts as "sunken galleons," works that were remote, archaic and mythological.
Legacy
*Théâtre Antoine Vitez on the campus of the University of Provence
The University of Provence Aix-Marseille I (french: Université de Provence) was a public research university mostly located in Aix-en-Provence and Marseille. It was one of the three Universities of Aix-Marseille and was part of the Academy of ...
, now Aix-Marseille University
Aix-Marseille University (AMU; french: Aix-Marseille Université; formally incorporated as ''Université d'Aix-Marseille'') is a public research university located in the Provence region of southern France. It was founded in 1409 when Louis II o ...
is named for him.
*Théâtre d'Ivry Antoine Vitez in
Ivry-sur-Seine
Ivry-sur-Seine () is a commune in the Val-de-Marne department in the southeastern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the centre of Paris.
Paris's main Asian district, the Quartier Asiatique in the 13th arrondissement, borders the ...
, is also named for him.
Filmography
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Vitez, Antoine
1930 births
1990 deaths
French theatre directors
Male actors from Paris
Administrators of the Comédie-Française
French male film actors
French male television actors
French male stage actors
20th-century French male actors
20th-century French translators
20th-century French poets
French male poets
20th-century French male writers
French male non-fiction writers