The actress and director Julie Delille has been appointed director of the Théâtre du Peuple in Bussang (Vosges), and will become in October the first woman to direct this institution classified as a historic monument, we learned on Monday. “This place has a unique temporality, the notion of seasonality finds its full meaning here,” said the artist in a message posted on the theater’s Facebook page, renowned for its backstage which opens directly onto the Vosges forest. .
“I want this theater to be a place of thought and a preserved poetic space, a shelter where it is possible to take the time, to summon the relationship to the works of the mind as a possible response to the crises we are going through”, said she completed. In her new role, she plans to rely on two artists with whom she is used to working, Alix Fournier-Pittaluga and Paul Francesconi.
Julie Delille was unanimously appointed by the ten members of the selection jury, made up of the Association du Théâtre du Peuple de Bussang Maurice Pottecher, and its public partners, the regional directorate for cultural affairs Grand Est (DRAC), the region Grand Est, the department of Vosges, the community of communes of Ballons des Hautes Vosges and the city of Bussang. A total of 49 artists applied and 10 were shortlisted. “For us, it is essential that this theater be re-established in the territory, aimed at the most diverse audiences, in particular people who do not go to the theater, and Julie Delille has built a working method, based on the question of relationship, which is very important to us”, underlined with AFP François Rancillac, president of the association of the Theater of the People.
Trained at the Comédie de Saint-Étienne school, Julie Delille founded the company of the Théâtre des Trois Parques in 2015, with which she notably staged I am the beast, an adaptation of Anne Sibran’s book, which will be presented at the spring 2024 at the Nanterre-Amandiers theatre. She succeeds Simon Delétang, who left office during his term of office to join the national drama center in Lorient, and Alice Trousset, deputy director. The People’s Theater was founded in 1895 by Maurice Pottecher, who thus wished “to create a theater which would be accessible to all, to the whole people without exclusion of caste or wealth, and which could interest all”.
