Lia Rodrigues
Béatrice Massin
Dominique Hervieu Fables à la fontaine

Three fables for three female choreographers: with Fables à la fontaine, a re-run of a series of short pieces initiated in the year 2000’s, Lia Rodrigues joins forces with Béatrice Massin and Dominique Hervieu in a spirited, uninhibited staging of Jean de La Fontaine’s writing.

Lively, and aimed at family audiences, much like the original work by La Fontaine himself, these choreographic fables enable several different universes to enter into dialogue in a refreshing way. The Fables à la fontaine project came into being during the year 2000’s in response to a commission by Annie Sellem, founder of La Petite Fabrique, inviting choreographers from diverse horizons to take their inspiration from one of the famous allegories of the French poet.
This production brings together three of these pieces. Lia Rodrigues has chosen Contre ceux qui ont le goût difficile (Against Those Who Have Difficult Taste) a fable in which a dialogue is established between the author and his critics. In a mischievous way, the fable enables to her to identify “things in common between France at the time of the different Louis, described and criticized by the sharpness of La Fontaine’s plume, and the gaze we cast upon present-day Brazil, as well as the one which is cast upon us.” Alongside her, Béatrice Massin, a specialist in Baroque dance, plays on the echoes between the different eras in her exploration of the power struggles at work in Le Loup et l’Aigneau (The Wolf and the Lamb). Lastly, Dominique Hervieu offers us a “poetic invitation to critical thinking” by means of a rendition of Le Corbeau et le Renard (The Raven and the Fox), in which the art of flattery meets hip-hop. The three pieces provide audiences with a fruitful dialogue between literary heritage and artists who are very much part of their time.