Review: LE PRENOM at Theatre Edouard VII

Thanks to Theatre in Paris, I was able to enjoy this production at the Théâtre Edouard VII with the added bonus of English surtitles and an English program! Making theatre accessible in this way made my experience richer and deeper.

This French original, created in 2010 at the same theatre, has become a movie and a resounding success. It is a slice of life play and we watch the events unfold in real time. A scene many of us may be familiar with- a family gathers for dinner and gets into a wildly tangled argument. Secrets are revealed and, well, punches are thrown! And it all started with the announcement of a potential baby name.

This show is very well written. Nothing is too obvious, you really get to guess what games the characters are playing, which makes the evening fly by! The performances were enthusiastic and intense- they must have been a workout! The timing was so precise and the audience was roaring with laughter.

I hope I am not misinterpreted when I say this show is unbelievable- I am not attempting to offer exaggerated praise. I literally mean that it is not believable. The level of skill displayed by the entire cast and the designers as well made the world we came to know eerily next to reality. Everything was just a bit too heightened, a bit too much, to feel truly real. Sébastien Castro notably was performing a little over the line for me, with too many exaggerated facial expressions to be truly believable (though this could easily have been the directors choice and not his, and most of the audience seemed to love it!)

Ultimately, I hope this show comes back to Paris. We need more new scripts as witty and bold as this one.