Olivier Kemeid | Questioning the spectrum

Almost 10 years after the adventure of Five Kings, Olivier Kemeid returns to the Shakespearean forest at his own risk. In Revenge and oblivionthis is the story ofHamlet which he transposes into today’s Quebec. But be careful, nothing will go as planned…

The author and director welcomes us to the rehearsal room of the Théâtre de Quat’Sous which he directed for seven years – until last August. “I am here with family,” rejoices Olivier Kemeid, “but I am especially happy to be able to count on the outside perspective of Catherine (Vidal) and Xavier (Inchauspé)” – the new co-directors.

“The Shakespearean forest. » The expression is his. It came to him when he was working on Five Kingsa collection of five plays by Shakespeare (Richard II, III, Henry IV, V And VI). Returning to this thick forest remains a challenge, he tells us. “You can get lost there, there are places where the brambles are tight, other places where there are clearings where you can see a little better, but it’s always exhilarating. »

The genesis

To understand the seed that led to the writing of this play, we must go back to the years of study of young Olivier, in dramatic writing at the National Theater School.

“It was 2002,” Kemeid recalls. My writing godfather was Wajdi Mouawad, who directed Quat’Sous, and who wrote Fires. He lent me a book by Pierre Bayard, Investigation of Hamlet – The dialogue of the deaf, which questioned in a half-playful, half-serious way the murder of the King of Denmark by his brother Claudius. Basically, he wondered why anyone would believe the specter. Since when do the dead tell the truth? »

The idea of ​​writing a play inspired by this book slowly took hold, but life took him elsewhere. Five Kings rekindles his interest in adapting Hamlet, and at the end of his term as artistic director last summer, he said to himself: “It’s time to get started. »

But then, after he had written a few scenes, his father died. It was in July. And even though he passed away following a long illness, the blow is hard to take. The parallel with the death of the father (in his play) is too difficult to sustain. Last September, he still had nothing concrete to give to his actors. Then, little by little, during the fall, as the deadline approaches, it plunges.

Forget the Kingdom of Denmark, we are in Quebec. Today.

A father dies of an illness. He was a theater teacher. His son, who also does theater, watches over him. But a few months after his death, his mother (Mireille Naggar) tells him that she is in a relationship with his uncle (Richard Thériault), his father’s brother. It is then that the specter of the father appears, who announces to his son that it was his brother who killed him… He also encourages him to avenge him.

Revenge and oblivion then takes the form of an investigation. Is the ghost telling the truth? What is the origin of the relationship between mother and uncle? What are this uncle’s true motivations? Is the father white as snow or is he dragging skeletons in his closet? What is the son’s mental health?

Parallel to this story, the son (Gabriel Lemire) meets a girl, Ophélie (Anna Romagny), with whom he falls in love. But she also has a secret, which she will end up confessing to him. An increasingly distraught son, who confides throughout the duration of the play in a friend (Sasha Samar), whose loyalty he questions at times.

The father-son relationship

The fact remains that with this new play, Olivier Kemeid continues to explore the furrow of the father-son relationship, tackled head-on in The Aeneid, Me, in the red ruins of the century or even in Furious and desperate…

“The idea of ​​transmission and legacy interests me,” Olivier Kemeid tells us. What do we receive? What are we giving back? It’s something that goes through me as the son of an exile, an Egyptian immigrant. André Malraux said: “A heritage must be conquered.” It’s not true that we only receive. There are things that we receive in spite of ourselves, but there are things that we seek out or that we decide not to take…”

But the absence of the father also allows us to talk about the mother-son relationship, believes Olivier Kemeid, who also evokes, in a symbolic way, the need to “kill the father” in Shakespeare’s work.

How does he explain the presence of these specters through his pieces – The Aeneid, Me, in the red ruins of the century… ?

“I think there is a link with the dialogue I pursued with my Egyptian grandfather, who gave me a taste for writing. I have the impression that exiles live with specters of their past life, of their culture, sometimes with members of their family who did not accompany them, who remained there, so I think I have a bit inherited from that. »

From revenge, therefore, we clearly see the parallel with Shakespeare’s play, in which the specter of King Hamlet appears to the son and informs him that he was murdered by his brother and therefore invites his heir to avenge him, but what oversight are we talking about exactly in this rereading?

“We have to make room in our memory,” replies Olivier Kemeid. People who have experienced trauma remain stuck on images that they must learn to get out of their memory, without completely forgetting them. Forgetting is also here a form of forgiveness, a way of ending the cycle of revenge. »

Since leaving his position as artistic director at Quat’Sous, it is his work as an author that he has returned to with the greatest pleasure. In addition to the production of Revenge and oblivionhis novel The old world behind us, launched two years ago by Editions Leméac, will be published in France next August. Olivier Kemeid is also working on a film script and another play.

“It takes time to write,” the author tells us. It takes time to wander around. So I’m happy to be able to devote myself to that (lounging) to work on new projects. »

Revenge and oblivion at the Théâtre de Quat’Sous, until May 11

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