Le Moche: the new play at the Comédie-Française Studio-Théâtre

Part wry comedy, part futuristic fable, Marius von Mayenburg 's Le Moche is an incisive and disturbing play that questions the aesthetic standards of our time. Scheduled at Studio-Théâtre de la Comédie-Française, this new production is directed by Aurélien Hamard-Padis, a familiar face at the Troupe and former resident of the Académie. The French translation is by Laurent Muhleisen, a specialist in contemporary German-language theater.

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In Le Moche , we follow Lette, a competent and discreet engineer, who suddenly discovers that he is deemed "too ugly" to represent his company at a convention. This sudden realization upsets his equilibrium and drives him to resort to plastic surgery. Once his face had been completely modified, he would become a figure of perfection, coveted, admired... but also copied. Soon, other men around him would adopt exactly the same face, until Lette's very identity dissolved into a strange uniformity.

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The play Le Moche takes a satirical look at a society where image prevails over content, where performance and appearance become normative values. This story, at once futuristic and terribly topical, would evoke the logics of standardization imposed by social networks, algorithms and artificial intelligence. The play would play with dark humor, fast-paced action and dialogue that would destabilize both the characters and the audience, confronting them with their own contradictions.

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Buoyed by the precision of the text and a scenic sequence that is as lively as it is effective, Aurélien Hamard-Padis's staging highlights the vertigo of identity experienced by the main character, and reveals a world where the quest for recognition leads to the total loss of singularity. The show, presented as a new production by the Comédie-Française, would also feature stroboscopic effects, indicated for the photosensitive.

This article is based on information provided by the Comédie-Française. The show has not been viewed.

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