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Theatre and Politics in Modern Quebec

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Theatre and Politics in Modern Quebec Elaine F. Nardocchio

The University of Alberta Press

First published by The University of Alberta Press Athabasca Hall Edmonton, Alberta, Canada 1986

Copyright ® The University of Alberta Press 1986

ISBN 0-88864-087-0 cloth 0-88864-088-9 paper

Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data Nardocchio, Elaine F. (Elaine Frances) Theatre and politics in modern Quebec ISBN 0-88864-087-0 (bound). ISBN 0-88864-088-9 (pbk.) 1. Theater - Quebec (Province) - Political aspects. 2. Canadian drama (French) - Quebec (Province) History and criticism.* 3. Theater - Quebec (Province) - Handbooks, manuals, etc. I. Title. PN2305.Q4N37 1986 792'.09714 C85-091489-2

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be produced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior permission of the copyright owner. Typesetting by Piece de Resistance Ltee., Edmonton. Printed by John Deyell Company, Lindsay, Ontario, Canada

T

O MY FAMILY, with thanks to Rolf Kalman


Contents

I II

III

IV

Foreword ix Introduction xi Politics, Religion, and the Early Theatre: From New France to Early Canada 1 Theatre in New France 3 English and French in Lower Canada 5 Rising Nationalism 10 The Difficult Years 14 The Duplessis Era: From the Dark Ages to a Coming of Age 19 Social and Cultural Conservatism 21 Actors, Directors, and Theatre Companies 25 Plays and Playwrights 29 Gratien Gelinas 34 Jacques Languirand 37 Marcel Dube 41 The Quiet Revolution: Nationalism and Quebec Drama 47 New Directions 49 Form and Content 53 Robert Gurik 59 Frangoise Loranger 63 Michel Tremblay 66 Theatre in Modern Quebec: Permanence and Change 75 Expanding Horizons 77 Revolutionary Theatre Groups 81 The Focus of Drama 90 Jean Barbeau 101 Jean-Claude Germain 107 Conclusion 115 Notes

119

Selected Bibliography Index 149

133


Foreword

T

HIS is A lively and timely book which will for many years be indispensable to students of Canadian drama and theatre. While Dr. Nardocchio's primary aim is to show how politicized Quebec's theatre has always been, she has also provided readers with an informed and informative guide to three hundred years of drama and theatre in French Canada. Theatre and Politics in Modern Quebec also demonstrates how powerful are the forces of colonization. Frechette's Pzpineau (1880), for example, confirmed Frechette's reputation as Quebec's leading writer and patriot, but while the play is ostensibly a glorification of French-Canadian virtues, it reveals a virulent cultural schizophrenia induced by English colonialism. Frechette makes nonsense of Papineau's role in the 1837 Rebellion by having him advocate peace with the English on the few occasions he appears on stage. Elzear Paquin's Riel (1886) explicitly warns Quebec of a threat of genocide to be carried out by the English and advocates a political option voiced for the first time in Quebec drama: "Before long Canada must enter the beautiful and flourishing Confederation of the United States." What Dr. Nardocchio's book does very well is document the tremendous vitality and diversity of Quebec theatrical activity in the years following the death of Maurice Duplessis when extraordinary and unparalleled changes took place in every aspect of life in the province. Stephen Dedalus in Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man declares he can only forge within the smithy of his soul the uncreated conscience of the Irish race when he has liberated himself from the nets of nationality, language, and religion. One sees a similar process of liberation in Quebec in this period as the Parti Quebecois under Rene Levesque strove to forge a new political conscience for Quebec, as a new generation of writers (Garneau, Tremblay) rejected the ' Francais de France' ' in favour of joual with its connotations of the anti-establishment and the proletariat, and as intellectuals in every field from education to economics changed Quebec into a secularized society - the Queen in Gurik's Hamlet, Prince de Quebec IX

THEATRE AND POLITICS IN MODERN QUEBEC

(1968) is the Catholic Church incestuously bedded with King Claudius or English Canada. Perhaps the most theatrical play illustrating the validity of Dr. Nardocchio's theme that theatre and politics in Quebec enjoy, and always have enjoyed, an enriching symbiotic relationship is Michel Tremblay's Hosanna (1973) which is a parable about Quebec and politics. Ttenblay is unequivocal on this point: My play, Hosanna, deals in a symbolic way with the problems of Quebec. Although Hosanna concerns two homosexuals, one an exaggerated masculine character, the other a transvestite, it is really an allegory about Quebec. In the end they drop their poses and embrace the real identity. The climax occurs when Hosanna kills Elizabeth Taylor and at the end he appears naked on stage and says he is a man. He kills all the ghosts around him as Quebec did. We are not French but we are Ouebecois living in North America! Theatre and Politics in Modern Quebec is essential reading for those interested in the Quebecois living in North America; if we believe in the unity of Canada we will read this book with great seriousness for it presents images common to all Canadians whether Quebecois or Albertans. As poet Miriam Waddington observes: We look like a geography but just scratch us and we bleed history. Eugene Benson Editor Canadian Drama, LArt dramatique canadien

x

Introduction

THEATRE IN today's Quebec is varied and dynamic T and francophone Quebec playwrights have assumed a significant role in its development. Most of the major companies devote at least some of their programming to French-speaking Canadian playwrights while the majority of the Young Theatre groups perform exclusively Ouebecois material. Thanks to a genuinely supportive educational system, indigenous playwrights are regularly and enthusiastically read, performed, and discussed by tens of thousands of Quebec high school and university students. The names of many of the playwrights presented here are household words to these students for whom theatre represents a most appropriate form for the expression of their hopes, and fears, both as individuals and as members of Quebec society. Quebec's dramaturgy has evolved from picturesque melodrama and simple comedy to high drama and provocative satire. It has changed while still maintaining a distinctly Quebec flavour. Although it is difficult to say which comes first, the social or the dramatic, it is certain that the relationship between these two realities has been evident in Quebec since the seventeenth century. Sometimes, in fact, the political, social, or linguistic repercussions of the theatre attract more attention than the plays themselves. In 1970, for instance, there was much ado about the refusal of the Quebec Ministry of Cultural Affairs to finance a Paris engagement for Michel Ttenblay's Les Belles-Soeurs because it was written not in acceptable, standard French but in joual, the popular, anglicized French spoken mainly in parts of Montreal.1 On the other hand, from 1950 to 1980 in particular, artistic creation flourished in Quebec at times of political and national crisis. The year of the Cross-Laporte kidnappings by members of the Front de Liberation du Quebec in October 1970, is a case in point. For this was also the year of the staging of such provocative plays as Medium saignant, La Duchesse de Langeais, and La Guerre, Yes Sir! XI


In many cases, the artistic serves as an outlet for political frustrations and national feelings of desperation when Quebec is threatened from within or without, But the relationship between art and nationalism goes even deeper in Quebec. Artistic creation in this province not only reflects political and socio-cultural struggles, it is part of them. Quebec's national identity depends to a large degree on her cultural identity. This book aims to provide information that will lead to a better knowledge and understanding outside of Quebec of the socio-political nature and implications of French-language theatre in Quebec. The emphasis, therefore, has not been put on the technical aspects of Quebec theatre but rather on the socio-political context in which theatre has developed in Quebec and on the thematic and ideological content of indigenous, French-language drama and comedy. Radio drama, stage craft, censorship, the role of drama critics, and the financial aspects of theatre in Quebec are only briefly touched on. The first part of this history introduces the subject by showing how even the sporadic and episodic works produced in French in Quebec, from the early seventeenth century to the middle of the twentieth century, were closely linked to the socio-political context of the time. The focus of the other three sections is on the evolution of French-language theatre in and around Montreal, Quebec's cultural capital, from the Duplessis era to the end of the 1970s. Particular attention is paid in these chapters to the social and theatrical impact of the works of the eight most important playwrights to influence and characterize Quebec theatre in the last thirty years. This study is based on material gathered from both original and secondary sources. It makes available to the English reader, some of the vast body of information that other scholars have published on French-language theatre and also provides informationgathered,by the author, from theatre archives, newspaper articles, and, in the case of modern theatre, personal interviews with theatre directors and writers.2 Theatre and Politics in Modern Quebec is intended as a general source book and ready guide to the many theatre people, groups, and plays that have contributed to one of the most dynamic aspects of Quebec's cultural life. In addition, it strives to provide a systematic and informative overview of the socio-political nature and evolution of theatre in French Quebec. The text, therefore, constantly refers, in summary form, to the major political, social, and historical developments in Quebec's past and present. This is done in order to demonstrate that throughout Quebec's theatre history, playwrights and theatre directors have consistently dealt with and been influenced by history and politics, the Church and the State. xii

I Politics, Religion and the Early Theatre: From New France to Early Canada


Theatre in New France

THE FIRST KNOWN theatrical performance in New T France was written and produced by a young lawyer and nobleman, Marc Lescarbot, who wanted to celebrate the return from their explorations of two important political figures, Jean de Poutrincourt, Governor of New France and Samuel de Champlain, founder of the colony. On November 14, 1606, Lescarbot and several soldiers, explorers, and Indians rode out in canoes and sloops from Port Royal, now Annapolis Royal, in Nova Scotia, to greet Poutrincourt and Champlain and to act out the verses that the young Frenchman had written. In the nautical masque which Lescarbot entitled, Le Theatre de Neptune en La Nouvelk France (The Theatre of Neptune in New France), Neptune, the god of the sea, welcomes the Governor and then sits on a high, brightly decorated floating chariot, a trident in hand, while six different Tritons and four Indians recount the adventures they had in his absence and communicate their love of the land. All speak in verse, some in standard French; some in Indian dialects, and others in broken French. The cast then showers Poutrincourt with compliments and offers him gifts. He thanks his elaborate welcoming committee and agrees to go ashore. Upon landing he is told, again in verse, of the sumptuous meal and the evening of merriment that await him. Le Theatre de Neptune was one of the few productions New France was to witness and certainly the last one to appear in the East for many years. There was little time for theatre anywhere, in fact, in those days. The small groups of settlers were too busy to be concerned with theatre. People tended to relax, when they had the time, in the taverns or, in the case of those from the country, in some friendly kitchen, playing cards and telling stories. There were, nevertheless, some plays produced in the seventeenth century in the larger centres such as Montreal and Quebec City.1 These were usually related in some way to politics and/or religion. In 1640, for instance, Governor Montmagny had a tragi-comedy performed in Quebec City to celebrate the birth of the new dauphin who was later to become Louis XIV of France. Mounted in one of the larger 3


rooms of the Governor's mansion, the Chateau St-Louis, the play depicted a poor non-Christian soul pursued by demons who eventually threw him into the flames of Hell The devils spoke Algonquin so that those Indians present might understand the moral significance of the play and realize the fate of the unfaithful. The plays performed during the next sixty years or so were sponsored mainly by the students of Quebec's Catholic seminaries and in some cases by the Governor. Corneille's tragedies, in particular Le Cid, were most popular.2 Private shows, for the benefit of students and priests, were performed in the college courtyards and chapels; those for the governor in the Chateau St-Louis. One of the largest trading companies and general stores, Cent-Associes, offered space for public performance. Although the Jesuit journals provide us with fewer than a dozen titles of plays, the chronicles of the times lead us to believe that stage productions were well-liked by the people of Quebec City. Theatre was, nevertheless, often harshly critized by church authorities.3 It must be remembered that the Church was a vital part of life during the French regime, not because the people themselves were particularly devout, but because of the important social role the clergy had played in the colony since its founding. In practice, Church and State were not separate in New France. In fact, some of the priest's salaries came from the royal coffers, as did the money to build the Catholic schools and churches.4 Moreover, although they came as missionaries, the priests and brothers soon became de facto administrators who often worked closely with the governor and his aide, the intendant.5 Nonetheless, they remained much more independent than their counterparts in France and the bishops kept a sharp eye on the colonists, the fur traders, and the political leaders. One of the best known examples of the power of the robe and its effect on the growth of theatre is an incident that occurred in Quebec in 1694.6 Frontenac was governor at the time, and Monseigneur de St-Vallier, Quebec's bishop. Frontenac decided to put on Moliere's Le Ttirtuffe in the Chateau St-Louis with one of his lieutenants, Jacques de Mareuil, in the leading role. This young officer was known as a braggart and a bit of a ladies' man who liked to shock society with his less than polite comments about his various love affairs. Although Frontenac's choice of Mareuil as leading man may have been appropriate type casting, it did little to enhance the chances of mounting a play that had been banned in France just a few years earlier. The good Monseigneur felt obliged to denounce Mareuil publicly in December 1693, and to threaten him with 4

Politics, Religion and the Early Theatre

excommunication if he did not mend his ways. At the same time, StVallier wrote about the dangers of presenting comedies that could corrupt their audiences. He was referring, of course, to Frontenac's proposed production of Le Tartuffe. The warning deterred neither Mareuil nor Frontenac. By this time, the entire town was witness to the confrontation of Church and State. The Church won out, although not without some manoeuvring on St-Vallier's part. On January 17, 1694, he met Frontenac in the public square and offered him a fairly large sum of money (one hundred pistoles) to defray the expenses incurred in preparation for Le Tartuffe, if he would cancel the performance. Much to everyone's surprise, Frontenac accepted the note that St-Vallier signed before him. The Governor later received a stiff rebuke from the French court for accepting what appeared to have been a bribe. Mareuil was held for a short time for questioning and defended by his good friend Frontenac, before returning to France in the fall of 1694. The Tartuffe Affair, as it is now called, effectively discouraged further theatrical productions in New France.7 In fact, we know of no public performance of a play after 1694 until the period immediately following what the Quebecois call La Conquete, i.e. the Conquest of New France by the British in 1760. Play-acting became the exclusive domain of a few of the colleges and seminaries. The Church's right to censor not only theatre but other art forms remained unquestioned for many years.

English and French in Lower Canada THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR between France and England T (1756-1763) was a long and costly one for France. In 1759 the English attacked Quebec City after having taken the supposedly impregnable fortress at Louisburg on Cape Breton Island. Montreal was ceded to the English in 1760, and New France formally became an English colony in 1763. This decisive confrontation between empires was regarded at the time, at least by the inhabitants of Canada, as simply a new political 5


arrangement that was not necessarily irrevocable. The Conquest did not, therefore, cause any immediate hostile reactions to the English. In fact, for many years the Francophones of Canada expected France to send more troops to reclaim its colony. Another factor contributing to the peaceful relations between the French and English following The Conquest was England's early attempts at reconciliation with the French. In 1774, despite opposition from the British merchants in Canada, the English Parliament approved the Quebec Act which officially recognized the right of French Canadians to their language, religion, and civil law. Many of the English officers of the time spoke fluent French and this also helped to maintain cordial relations between the conqueror and the conquered. In 1774 the English garrison troops stationed in Montreal further improved relations by performing, in French, two of Moliere's plays, Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme (The Would-be Gentleman) and Le Medecin malgrelui (The Doctor in Spite of Himself).8 The English thus managed to bring theatre alive once again while restoring Moliere's honour. Several tragedies were also performed in French for the Governor of Canada and other notables who happened to be in Montreal. They were presented in a splendid chateau that originally belonged to Monsieur de Vaudreuil, which became a Catholic college in 1773, the College St-Raphael The college hosted several productions, mostly religious plays, including Le Sacrifice d'Abmham (Abraham's Sacrifice) and jonathas et David ou le triomphe de I'amitie (Jonathas and David or Friendship's Triumph).9 Moliere and Beaumarchais were by far, however, the most popular playwrights in Montreal. Theatre proved to be a popular amusement in what might otherwise have been a drab existence for English officers in Montreal Like their French counterparts before them, the English troops laid no claim to professionalism and were happy to perform under less than perfect conditions. The two Moliere productions of 1774, for instance, were mounted in the candlelit home of Antoine Foucher, a Montreal notary. Monsieur Foucher hosted regular theatricals, and the English officers also managed to reserve one of the rooms in the Jesuit Fathers' residence, where they put on both tragedies and comedies. In keeping with the lively spirit of these productions, audiences did not take many of the productions too seriously; the fact that the unfortunate Monsieur Foucher was obliged on several occasions to replace broken windowpanes is a case in point.10 In 1779 the Montreal artist and musician Louis Dulongpre was asked to transform part of his home into a public 6


theatre for the benefit of the Francophones of Montreal.11 Dulongpre was to be responsible for the general upkeep and provide appropriate scenery for the playhouse, which became known as the Theatre de Societe. One of the principal instigators of this arrangement was Joseph Ouesnel. A native of Saint-Malo, France, Ouesnel was the commander of a French munitions ship en route to the new world when his ship was captured by the British off the shores of Newfoundland. Eventually, he obtained his liberty from General Haldimand, Governor of Canada. After a short visit to Mississippi, he settled in Boucherville, just outside Montreal where he subsequently became a poet and musician of some note. In 1790 one of Ouesnel's plays, a musical comedy that he had been carrying around with him for several years, was performed at the Theatre de Societe. Colas et Colinette ou le bailli dupe (Colas and Colinette, or the Bailiff Confounded) is one of Canada's earliest social dramas as well as its first operetta.12 Colas et Colinette is the story of two young peasants whose love is thwarted by a mean old bailiff who has his heart set on having Colinette for his own. When she rejects him for her master allows her the freedom to choose a husband-the bailiff tries to get rid of his rival, Colas, by tricking him into signing enlistment papers. Fortunately, disaster is averted at the last minute and all live happily ever after, except the bailiff, of course, who loses Colinette to Colas. The subject matter of another of Quesnel's dramatic works, L'Anglomanie (Anglomania), subtitled Le Diner a l'anglaise (Dinner English-Style), is far more local in flavour. This one-act comedy, written in 1802, depicts a French family in Lower Canada. The head of the family, Seigneur Primenbourg, has been trying to make himself over ever since his daughter's marriage to an English colonel. The play opens with a family discussion about a dinner the Primenbourgs intend to give for the English Governor. Monsieur Primenbourg insists on having an English-style service and meal and does not want any of his French relatives to be present. All the planning proves to be to no avail, however, for the Governor, having heard about the proposed meal and guest list, sends word that he will come to dinner when the Primenbourgs' relatives will be present, as he wants to meet some French people and to dine a francaise. Today's audiences might be particularly impressed by the fact that theatre in the English colony dealt with social and cultural issues. Those who praised the satirical L'Anglomanie13 were acknowledging, as Monsieur Primenbourg finally did in the play, that being French is neither better nor worse than being English. The implication was that the two cultures 7


could and should exist amicably side by side with neither having to sacrifice its own social or political values. Joseph Quesnel wrote two other works: La Soiree du Cabaret ou Les Republicains francais (An Evening of Cabaret or The French Republicans) also written in 1800 and Lucas et Cecile, an opera begun in 1808 but not completed before Quesnel's death in 1809. In spite of these flurries of activity in Montreal, theatre was not yet regularly patronized or recognized as a legitimate form of entertainment in Lower Canada.14 As noted earlier, a great deal of the enthusiasm for theatre came from the local garrisons. With the English troops stationed in Montreal, after The Conquest, there was even less theatrical activity in Quebec City. There were only three locations in Quebec City where one could see a stage performance:15 the Royal Circus (1824), where equestrian events were popular and where the garrison amateurs put on English comedies, tragedies, and pantomimes; the Theatre St-Louis (1845), which, in spite of its name, housed English productions such as the ones put on at the Royal Circus, some vaudeville, and even an art show or two; and the Theatre Royal du Marche a Foin, the old Haymarket Theatre, which had remained open almost without interruption since opening in 1790. Until it closed its doors in 1840, and with the exception of a few interruptions, including its closing from 1814 to 1816, this playhouse offered two to three one-night performances a month for a small core of faithful theatregoers. Amateur theatre groups performed locally written plays there, as well as Moliere, Beaumarchais, Racine, and Corneille for the British and French ladies and gentlemen of the city. Apart from the plays that were presented at the Haymarket Theatre, the public could also attend concerts featuring famous artists such as Ellen Tree, as well as auctions and booksales.16 Throughout the nineteenth century, although the population was now too large to be easily controlled, the Church continued to warn of the dangers of the theatre. Perhaps for this reason, professional French theatre was the exception rather than the rule in Lower Canada. Most of the French-language plays were performed by amateur groups including college students, such as those at the College de Nicolet founded in 1827 and Montreal's College Ste-Marie, established in 1848.17 In the first half of the nineteenth century, theatre in Lower Canada belonged mainly to the English. Most of the productions were in English, and although both French and English attended, it was the English garrison troops and their friends who made up the majority of the spectators. Between 1804 and 1898 at least twenty-five theatres were opened in Montreal for these eager audiences.18 Some of the best known included 8


the Montreal Theatre (1818), which later became a hotel called Mansion House; the Hayes Theatre (1847), which was used for a time as the Parliament Building after the original burned down in 1849; Mechanic's Hall (1854), where the young opera star Emma Lajeunesse performed before becoming the world-famous Albani; the Academie de Musique (1874), which housed some of the most famous visiting shows, including those of Sarah Bemhardt, Jane Hading, and Albani; the Monument National (1890), established by the St-Jean Baptiste Society to encourage local French theatre; Her Majesty's Theatre (1898), which became a fashionable centre for the arts; the Theatre des Varietes (1898) where three well-known actors performed regularly: Leon Petitjean, who was from France, J.P. Filion and Palmieri, the latter two both Canadians. The most lively of all the theatres was the Theatre Royal, or the Molson Theatre which was built in 1825, torn down between 1844 and 1845 and rebuilt in 1851. Unfortunately, several of the playhouses that sprang up in the nineteenth century fell victim to the many fires that plagued the colony.19 Nor were all the halls committed to productions of plays. Some preferred to allocate their time to minstrel shows and instrumental and operatic entertainments. The stage of the Royal, for example, saw not only vaudeville and pantomime performances, but also hosted famous magicians.20 For many years Montreal's theatre scene depended on the touring companies that either originated in the United States or began their North American tours there. Although they were often dictated by American tastes, the programs offered varied fare and included the works of major writers (Shakespeare, Sheridan, and Goldsmith) as well as the more frivolous melodramas and comedies of the time. Some of the greatest English-speaking actors of the day performed in Montreal, most often at the Theatre Royal. Among the best known were Edmund Kean (1826), John Wilkes Booth (1839), Charles Dickens (1843), William-Charles Macready (1844), and Barry Sullivan (1859).21 A few well-known French-speaking actors performed in Montreal, in the late 1800s, at the Academie de Musique. Two popular Canadian-bom actresses, Blanche de la Sablonniere and Mademoiselle Rhea, also performed at the Academie.22 But the most famous guest artist of all was France's Sarah Bemhardt.23 Bernhardt made her first appearance in Canada in 1880. She came in a blaze of glory late in the month of December, directly from a New York tour. This time it didn't matter that the touring company had performed first in the United States and that the programs were printed in English. Here was a real star, and from France! When Bernhardt finally arrived 9


in Montreal's Windsor station, thousands of fans greated her with '' Vive la France" as an orchestra struck up the Marseillaise. The Quebec poet Louis Frechette had even prepared an ode, which he read to the famous actress while she stood patiently listening on the platform in sub-zero weather. The Bishop of Montreal, Monseigneur Fabre, warned against attending a play that openly depicted adultery, but Sarah Bernhardt's production of Adrienne Lecouvreur by Scribe and Legouve played to a packed house at its Canadian premiere on December 23, 1880. During the next few days Bernhardt performed in three other French dramas. Unfortunately, most Ouebecois stay home on Christmas Day, and the hall was half empty on December 25.24 Nevertheless, in spite of her disappointment, the rowdy crowds, and the bitter cold, this great actress kept enough good memories of her first trip to Montreal to inspire her to return to perform nine times between 1880 and 1917.25 Other great French stars, such as the Parisian actress Rejane who performed at the Academie de Musique in 1895, followed in her footsteps. In general, however, and in spite of these glorious visits, relatively little French-language theatre was presented to the general public in the nineteenth century either in Montreal or Quebec City.

Rising Nationalism

R

ELATIONS BETWEEN THE FRENCH and English in Canada Rbecame increasingly strained in the nineteenth century. The causes for the mounting tensions were varied: increased English immigration required the French to vie, often fruitlessly, for key business and administrative positions; as the remaining workable land along the St. Lawrence became scarce, more Canadiens began moving into the cities; a new desire for a truly democratic government began to grow; and the colony's struggle for control of its own finances was intensifying. In 1837 a group of Canadiens known first as Les Fils de la Liberte (Sons of Liberty) and later as Les Patriotes rebelled against British rule in a struggle for independence that was paralleled in Upper Canada by the 10


efforts of the Reformers, led by William Lyon Mackenzie.26 There were several sporadic battles in 1837 and again in 1838, but only a few of these skirmishes were won by the Patriotes who were badly organized and poorly armed. When the Rebellion was finally put down, most of its leaders had either been imprisoned, exiled, or hanged. The defeat appeared most decisive. In England, Lord Melbourne's government decided to launch an inquiry into the uprisings and engaged John George, Earl of Durham, to lead the investigation. Durham arrived in Quebec on May 29,1838, and on January 31, 1839 he filed his Report and Dispatches of the Earl of Durham, Her Majesty's High Commissioner and Governor-General of British North America.21 According to Durham, the crisis in Lower Canada had arisen because of a struggle between the French and the English. In his view, the troubles went beyond simple political quarrels, and he concluded that the only way to prevent further conflict was to assimilate the French as quickly as possible. He therefore strongly recommended the union of the two Canadas with the aim of creating an English-speaking majority. The French Canadians were crushed. Not only did Durham seem to have no understanding whatsoever of the causes of the Rebellion, he openly supported assimilation through union. Since they had just suffered defeat at the hands of the British, there seemed no other means to ensure their survival as a race than to retreat to rural areas and to increase vigilance over their language, culture, and religion.28 It is not surprising that the English-dominated theatre became less and less popular with the Canadiens. They were preoccupied with their political, cultural, and even physical survival, and had little inclination to meet socially with those who represented a danger to their way of life. Moreover, there was no agreement among the Canadiens themselves as to what their course of action should be. On those rare occasions when they did gather together at a theatre, the various factions would sometimes come to blows, ostensibly over the play they were seeing. In one of Montreal's theatres, for instance, just before the first shots of the Rebellion were fired, a young member of Les Fils de laLiberterefused to take off his hat when "God Save the Queen" was played. A fight ensued that resulted in some broken chairs and bloody noses. One of the assailants, Dr. Jones, later met the young man who had started the fight, Rodolphe Desrivieres, in a duel. No one was killed, but the hard feelings that surrounded the incident lasted for many years.29 Just after the Rebellion in 1839, a theatre in Quebec City, the Royal Circus, witnessed a similar 11


incident. This time the disturbance occurred because of the subject matter of the play, La Mort de Cesar (Caesar's Death) by Voltaire. The passions of the audience were so aroused at the mention of political insurrection and assassination that the theatre did not close until the general turmoil finally broke up at two o'clock in the morning.30 Not surprisingly, historical dramas became the most popular form of theatre among Canadiens after the Rebellion. With apparently no future before them, French Canadians seemed to find solace in their past.31 Francois-Xavier Garneau's Histoire du Canada (1845) instilled a new pride in a people threatened with assimilation and contributed to the creation of a mystique of the past. In 1844 the students of the College de Nicolet performed a historic threeact tragedy in verse written by Antoine Gerin-Lajoie.32 Le Jeune Latour (Young Latour), French-Canada's first historical play dramatizes the political and military confrontation between the French and the English and its effect on two members of the same family. Young Latour has managed to hold a French post in Acadia. His father, who has aligned himself with the future rulers of his country, tries in vain to persuade his son to accept the conciliatory offer of a government job that England has made to him. If his son refuses, the father will lose his privileged position with the English. The young Latour prefers to fulfil his duty towards his mother country even if it means sacrificing his father's future and his own as well. Theatre, at least in this case, compensates for reality, for the young Latour successfully resists the attacks of the English and finally, magnanimously, agrees to shelter his father. What joy there was in the hall that night in 1844 when the French triumphed over the English, if only on stage!33 Le Jeune Latour was the first of a series of historical dramas presented on Montreal stages and in her colleges. Louis Frechette's piece Papineau appeared at Montreal's Academie de Musique in May 1880, and Le Retour de I'exile (The Return of the Exile) in June of the same year. His Felix Poutre was presented in Quebec City in 1862.34 All three plays concerned the heroes and events of 1837-38 and preached a sort of reconciliation between the two peoples that had fought each other in Lower Canada. At the same time, in spite of their desire for peace, the heroes also continued to dream of the day when the Canadiens would be free from British rule. The first known comedy written by a French-speaking Canadian was performed by an amateur group in Quebec City in 1848.35 La Donation (The Gift), by Pierre Petitclair, tells the story of a young couple whose 12


happiness is threatened. The villain forges papers to show that the would-be fiance is already married and hence cannot wed the rich merchant's daughter. All ends well, however, for the culprit is found out, the two lovers are reunited, and the merchant showers them with money. Another of Petitclair's several comedies, Une Partie de campagne (A Country Outing), was performed, again by amateurs, in Quebec City on April 22, 1857. It depicts the goodness and sincerity of some French Canadians in contrast to the snobbishness of those who have chosen to renounce their origins. In the same way that the question of false papers in La Donation brings to mind an incident involving falsely signed papers in Joseph Quesnel's Colas et Colinette, the moral about being true to one's culture in Une Partie de campagne is similar to the one presented by Quesnel in LAnglomanie. Needless to say, there were no copyright laws at the time and even prominent writers were not above ' 'borrowing'' from the works of others. In any case, Petitclair's play was original as far as the dialogue was concerned, since he used the rural vernacular when appropriate. Very few French-Canadian playwrights of this period used the local idiom when writing plays about their countrymen. Another favourite comedy writer among the amateur groups was FelixGabriel Marchand, premier of Quebec between 1897 and 1900. His oneact comedy Un Bonheur en attire un autre (One Piece of Luck Attracts Another) was put on just outside Montreal in St-Jean-d'Iberville in June 1883. The play was performed at a benefit for the families of those killed during the 1837-38 Rebellion.36 Marchand's best-remembered play today is Les Faux Brillants (The Counterfeits), published in 1883 and performed at the Monument National in 1905. This verse play tells the story of yet another swindler, a false Italian baron who is, of course, finally publicly denounced.37 Marchand's piece reminds us of Quesnel's LAnglomanie and Petitclair's Une Partie de campagne in that it pits the ostentatious against those who are honest and unpretentious. In both works, remaining loyal to one's self and to one's origins, has nationalist as well as moral overtones.

13


The Difficult Years

I

IN THE LATE NINETEENTH century, amateur dramatic clubs or Cercles sprang up all over the province from Longueuil to Hull, from St-Hyacinthe to Lotbiniere.38 The St-]ean Baptiste Society organized many of these amateur groups, particularly in Montreal. In November 1898, at its new hall, the Monument National, this nationalist organization inaugurated what came to be known as the Soirees defamille (Family Nights), during which young, and not so young, ladies and gentlemen practised elocution.39 This was a most astute way of warding off any interference from the Church. Those who were taking elocution lessons had to have some way of practising their public speaking claimed the organizer Elzear Roy. And what better way was there than by means of a Drama Society that would sponsor nonprofit public performances. Some of the most prominent citizens of the time, judges, lawyers, and professors, took part in these weekly Soirees either as performers or as enthusiastic spectators. The program was an excellent way to acquaint audiences and performers alike with what was considered the "good" French theatre of the time, both local and foreign. Elocution or declamation, as it was called, was now seen to be a necessary part of every well-educated person's training. Finally, a high standard of acting, such as that of the visiting professional theatres, was demanded by the public, even from those who were not stars. Unfortunately, these Soirees only lasted three years. In 1902 Montreal's municipal government passed a law forbidding theatrical productions on Sundays. Many theatregoers who had considered Sunday a day of leisure found it difficult to attend theatre during the week, and simply stopped going. Besides, they could now see the new moving pictures on any day of the week. By 1904 some theatres, including the prestigious Monument National, were offering short movies between acts. By 1906 many were offering short sketches between film presentations. And in 1909, a heavy blow was dealt to theatre in the form of an amusement tax levied by the municipal government. Attendance dropped so badly and expenses rose so high that in 1910 the historic Academie de Musique was forced to close its doors. Although the list of theatres in the early 1900s is long, that of permanent playhouses is very short indeed. For every playhouse that 14


opened in those days another would close. The Monument National and the Theatre des Varietes were the only established theatres that withstood the storm. As audience participation dwindled, so did the number of touring companies that came to Montreal. This in turn created a more positive attitude of Montrealers toward their own artists as local theatre buffs became determined to establish a bigger and better autonomous theatre in the city. In 1904 Georges Gauvreau, director of the Theatre National, instituted a one-act play competition that allowed aspiring playwrights to have their works presented at least once in their lifetimes.40 Although this competition, which continued for several years, did not uncover any outstanding writers, many, such as Louis Guyon, Alfred Descarrie, and Julien Daoust, enjoyed considerable success at the time their plays were staged in Gauvreau's contests. Thanks mostly to the world-renowned actors who had played in their city, Montreal audiences were aware of international standards of acting and continued to be very demanding, even at the amateur level. As a result, amateur theatre was becoming increasingly selective and critical of its own work. The first Earl Grey Musical and Dramatic Competition for amateur acting companies was held in Ottawa in 1907. It was sponsored by Canada's Governor General Lord Albert Grey.41 These competitions brought together amateur groups from across Canada to compete for prizes in acting, stage exits and entrances, diction, dress, make-up, and carriage. Frenchlanguage groups were few but nevertheless present in the national finals over the five years the competition was held. In 1908 the Theatre National, under the French actor Paul Cazeneuve's management, played host to an Amateur Actor's Festival. Eighteen different Cercles participated in the competition, all from Montreal and the surrounding area.42 Although there were some prizes for stage direction, most were distributed for elocution, carriage, and stage presence. In 1907, in response to popular demand for well-trained. actors and actresses, a well-known actor, Eugene Lassalle, managed to open a theatre school which he called the Conservatoire Lassalle.43 There were several organizations at the time that called themselves conservatories, but Lassalle's was the only one that not only gave elocution lessons but actually offered courses in acting as well as in the study of the great classical plays. Lassalle instilled in the minds of many the importance of choosing fine plays and performing them well His was a serious and sincere effort 15


to improve theatre in Montreal. In 1908 the Conservatory was officially recognized by the provincial government as being a useful and necessary part of the public education system. Incorporated into the University of Montreal in 1920, it became a private college once again in 1973. World War I caused the ranks of theatre groups to be markedly reduced as Canadians left to fight in Europe. With their return, theatre slowly got back to its feet, and Montrealers began once more to applaud their own actors and directors. Vaudeville flourished after the war. In addition, many amateur actors began receiving money to cover their expenses and could therefore afford to go on performing. On the other hand, many professional actors could still not depend on acting jobs to provide a basic living wage. The French-Canadian actor, Ernest Guimond, for example, was obliged to be somewhat of a jack-of-all-trades.44 He was not only a busy actor. He also wrote many patriotic and/or moralistic plays that were produced on Montreal stages throughout the 1920s and 1930s.45 His first play was presented in 1922 at one of Montreals' few French theatres, the Chanteclerc. Le Martyre d'une mere (A Mother's Suffering) was so well received that it was adapted for radio in 1935 and toured the province in 1937. This and similar tours were often only one-night performances in cold, ill-equipped halls. Nevertheless, they kept theatre alive and local actors and playwrights in pocket money. Needless to add, the actors of the day, who changed roles as quickly as they changed theatres, had to have a strong physical constitution as well as a definite talent for character portrayal if they were to become known by the public. Writers, too, had to struggle to survive. The first thirty years of the twentieth century saw very few playwrights whose plays did not fall into oblivion soon after their performance. For instance, Henri Deyglun, a French-born playwright, wrote about fifty melodramas and several hundred radio skits and revues.46 If he is remembered at all today, however, it is for only one of his plays which was presented in 1936 at the Arcade and later made into a sentimental film: Coeur de maman (Mommy's Heart). One can also cite the case of Louis Guyon.47 Although he wrote four patriotic dramas, Dens le Patriote (Denis the Patriot), Montcalm, Jos Montferrand, Les Ceintures flechees (Woven Belts), which were subsequently well received when performed at the Monument National between 1902 and 1928 and one melodramatic comedy, Un Mariage a la Gaumine (An Unorthodox Marriage) which won third prize at the Gauvreau competition of 1929,48 all his work has been virtually forgotten. 16


One of the most memorable works of the time Aurore, I'enfant martyr (Aurore, Child Martyr) was produced and performed at the St-Denis theatre in 1929 by the Fred Barry-Albert Duquesne acting company and recorded for posterity in a film of the same name made in the late 1940s. Like so many others, the names of Leon Petitjean and Henri Rollin, the coauthors of this sensational melodrama, have practically fallen into oblivion. Nevertheless, the story of the young and saintly Aurore, who was made to suffer in the extreme by her evil stepmother, was long remembered in Quebec.49 During the thirties radio provided the only economic security for many Canadians who were hired to write and perform skits and revues. It was a particular boon to French-speaking actors and writers. It not only provided them with a living, it also gave a much needed measure of respectability to their profession, still regarded as a not entirely reputable one for a French Canadian. Some of French-Canada's best known writers got their start by writing scripts for radio. CBC, which began broadcasting in French and English in Montreal in 1933, and later Radio Canada (1940) were particularly valuable in this regard. Robert Choquette, Claude-Henri Grignon, Roger Lemelin, Henri Deyglun, Jean Desprez, Pierre Dagenais, and Gratien Gelinas wrote skits, plays, and serials for the new medium.50 In 1930 the old criticisms as to the propriety of the theatre were raised once more, this time by the local courts. When a Parisian company performed a very popular, somewhat risque operetta, entitled Phi-Phi, at Montreal's St-Denis theatre, it was judged indecent and closed down.51 The actors, their agent, and even the orchestra leader were fined fifteen dollars each. Soon after, the local actor, J.P. Filion, was appointed Montreal's first official censor and guardian of morality. Hardly a severe man, Filion used his office for the purpose of building a collection of theatre documents, which he willed to the Montreal Municipal Library. The same year saw the opening of the Stella, the only permanent Frenchlanguage playhouse in Quebec. The Stella put on the latest ''respectable'' successes, sometimes a new one every week. This theatre was also a showcase for several well-known Canadian actors: Mimi d'Este, Gaston Dauriac, Pierre Durand, Antoinette Giroux, Henri Letondal, Armand Leclaire. The Fred Barry-Albert Duquesne troupe performed there regularly, and the playhouse, the old Chanteclerc, provided intimate atmosphere for the production of both the classics and the standard, respectable, Parisian hits.52 In 1935, however, the Stella closed for lack of a public. The future appeared bleak indeed for French-language theatre in Quebec and, as we shall see, for the province's ability to come to grips with the twentieth century. 17


II The Duplessis Era: From the Dark Ages to a Coming of Age


Social and Cultural Conservatism

T

HHE THIRTIES and the forties were difficult periods in Quebec's social, political, and economic history. Maurice Duplessis, who held power in Quebec almost without interruption from 1936 to 1959, was a traditionalist and a conservative who sought to make Quebec a closed society, isolated from the rest of the world.1 However, even this powerful premier could not hold back the tide of industrialization and urbanization that followed World War II. He responded by granting huge concessions to American and English-Canadian firms which came to control vast portions of Quebec's natural resources. Duplessis believed that industry should be developed by outsiders so as not to interfere with the farm-life of the French Canadians. Nevertheless, the French left the farms and flocked to the cities, thus contributing to the rapid economic growth of Quebec. During the period beginning in 1939 and ending around 1950 the labour force doubled, production of manufactured goods increased almost a hundredfold, and agriculture as a way of life sharply declined.2 Because Duplessis continued to resist this urbanization, he made no attempt to legislate fair treatment of the workers. As a result protest groups arose that denounced Duplessis's economic and labour policies and advocated a new spirit of reform. Among the most important of these were the reform nationalists of the BlocPopulaire,led by Andre Laurendeau and Jean Drapeau. They challenged Duplessis in the 1944 provincial elections and managed to win fifteen per cent of the popular vote. The labour movement's most notable event in the Duplessis era was the Asbestos strike of 1949 during which the miners at Asbestos and Thetford Mines defied the authority of the government by illegally striking for better wages and working conditions.3 Montreal's Archbishop Joseph Charbonneau openly sympathized with the workers and sharply criticized the repressive tactics Duplessis used to suppress the strike. The confrontation between the courageous archbishop and the determined premier would later inspire a lively play by Toronto-born writer John Thomas McDonough, Charbonneau et le chef (Charbonneau and le Chef) which 21


played to large Quebec City and Montreal audiences when it was first produced in translation in 1970. Rebellion was not confined to the political and labour arenas. In 1948, led by Paul-Emile Borduas, a group of painters and writers wrote and distributed a manifesto entitled Refus Globed (Total Refusal). The Manifesto denounced the clerical obscurantism and narrow-mindedness of the social and political system, and called for freedom of experimentation in the artistic field. Many of those who signed their names to the critique were harshly rebuked by religious, educational, and political groups who were not about to let their authority be questioned. Borduas, for instance, lost his job at the School of Design in Montreal. It was not until the late 1960s that the "automatic" school, so named because of its nonstructured form of art, was generally praised and accepted.4 Time has healed many of the wounds incurred during the Duplessis years. Historically, however, his "reign" is still referred to as la Grande Noirceur (The Great Darkness). As we have seen, things were looking pretty gloomy for theatre in Quebec at the beginning of the Duplessis era. Fortunately, and ironically, a clergyman, Father Emile Legault, appeared on the scene. Working within the church-dominated system, this enterprising priest and artistic director of the College St-Laurent on the outskirts of Montreal, created solid theatre and influenced an entire generation of actors and directors. In 1937 one of his first presentations, a religious play by Father Louis Barjon entitled Celle qui la portefits'ouvrir (She Who Opened the Door), was so well received that his group was invited to perform in Notre-Dame's church hall in Old Montreal. It was after this modest success that Father Legault founded Les Compagnons de St-Laurent.5 At first made up of only six young enthusiasts who adhered to Legault's goal of promoting Christian theatre, the group eventually grew to include students and alumni from all over the Montreal area. Because Legault sought to develop a truly Canadian corps of actors, he discouraged any tendency to create stars and emphasized team work. His actors trained together, played together, and even went to mass together. In 1938 the provincial government gave Legault a scholarship, one of its first, to go to Europe to study theatre. In France, Legault was influenced by the well-known directors Jouvet, Baty, Dullin, and Pitoeff, and was particularly impressed with Jacques Copeau's innovations in staging. When he came back to Canada a year later, he had developed his theories on team effort to include all aspects of theatre production. Legault quickly began organizing classes in stage design, costumes, make-up, music and, 22

The Duplessis Era

dance. His actors learned mime and improvisation, precision of gesture through physical exercises, theories of playwriting, and the history of the theatre. Stage direction, as well as knowledge of what made a good play, made up an important part of Legault's training program.6 At first, Les Compagnons de St-Laurent presented the religious theatre of Claudel, Chancerel, and Gheon7. Then in the mid-forties they introduced the classics and contemporary works to Montreal audiences: Shakespeare, Moliere, Musset, Anouilh. Legault had widened his horizons to include "Christian-like" works. Before Les Compagnons de St-Laurent disbanded in 1952, Father Emile Legault had succeeded in establishing a well trained, professional theatre organization in Quebec. With the continuous support of the Church, on which he often depended to provide halls such as 1'Ermitage and the Gesu, he developed actors and directors and educated the tastes of a public who sometimes numbered as many as 3,000 for a particular play. Moreover, thanks to their regular tours, Les Compagnons de St-Laurent popularized the idea of high-quality production, not only in Montreal but throughout the province. Many of the young men and women who studied and worked with Legault went on to become leading figures in Montreal's professional theatre. Among this group we note some of modem Quebec's finest actors: Lionel Villeneuve, Charlotte Boisjoli, Gilles Pelletier, Robert Prevost, JeanPierre Masson, Georges Groulx, Helene Loiselle, Jean Coutu, Jean Duceppe; as well as actor-directors Jean Gascon, Jean-Louis Roux, Guy Hoffman, Jacques Letoumeau, Guy Provost, and Florent Forget.8 The only criticism one might make of Legault's theatre is that it was oriented almost exclusively toward European drama, and did little to contribute to the development of a Canadian repertoire. But then, at that time, none of the companies in Quebec did. In 1943, for instance, Pierre Dagenais's company 1'Equipe presented its first play, a French piece, Altitude 3,200 by Julian Luchaire, at the Monument National. Avant-garde foreign plays such as Margaret Kennedy's Tessa ou la Nymphe au coeur fidele (Giraudoux's adaptation of the Constant Nymph), Martin du Gard's Le Testament du Pere Leleu (Father Leleu's Will), Cocteau's Les Parents terribles (intimate Relations), and Sartre's Huis Clos (No Exit) were performed as well as popular works by Moliere, Shaw, and Salacrou.9 Soon after 1'Equipe went bankrupt in 1947, several members of Dagenais's team, Jean St-Denis, Roger Garceau, Janine Sutto, and Yvette Brind'Amour, along with her friend Mercedes Palomino, regrouped to found 23


Le Theatre du Rideau Vert. Parisian boulevard comedies formed the basis of this company's repertoire.10 Like its predecessor, the Rideau Vert did not survive for long. Created on an ad hoc basis with no real goals or policies other than the desire to put on plays it came to an end in 1952. It had brought together both full-time professionals as well as part-time amateurs actors but little time was devoted to the directing and technical side of theatre. Actually, with no permanent hall, little team spirit, and only a small following, it is surprising that the original Rideau Vert lasted the five years it did. The Rideau Vert did not leave much of a mark on the theatre of the forties. Nor did the even smaller companies that sprang up at the time such as the Compagnie du Masque, founded by Charlotte Boisjoli and Fernand Dore in 194811, and the Theatre d'Essai, which Jean-Louis Roux and Jean Gascon set up in 1949 but which folded in 1951.12 None of these companies were very interested in presenting Canadian plays, and only a handful of local writers managed to have their work produced by them during the late forties and early fifties. Pierre Dagenais produced two of his own plays, Le Temps de vivre (Time to Live) and LeDiable s'en mele (The Devil Gets Involved) in 1948 and 1949 respectively, and Paul Toupin's Brutus in 1952. The Compagnie du Masque put on another Toupin play, Le Choix (The Choice), in 1951 while the Theatre d'Essai performed Eloi de Grandmont's Un Fils a tuer (A Son for the Killing) and Jean-Louis Roux's Rose Latulippe in 1951. One of the few encouragements for writers came from the Societe des Ecrivains (Writers' Society) which staged one-act plays with free admission to give local writers a chance to present their work.!3 Henri Letondal and Jean Desprez tried their hand with them but with little success. Yvette Mercier-Gouin was more fortunate with her works particularly with La Reussite (A Game of Patience), which was later performed in Paris in 1939 by a French company.14 In addition Leopold Houle,15 Armand Leclaire,16 Pamphile Lemay,17 Marie-Victorin,18 and Father Gustave Lamarche19 had their works produced before and after World War II in Montreal's theatres and halls. Of these, Father Lamarche's plays received the most popular support. Several of his mystical, poetic plays, such as Jonathas and La Passion de Jean-le-Baptiste (The Passion of John the Baptist) were successfully presented in colleges throughout Quebec, particularly in the regions of Rigaud and Joliette. Father Lamarche was also responsible for at least two grandiose biblical productions. LeDefaite de l'enfer (Hell Defeated), presented outdoors in 24

The Duplessis Era

Rigaud in 1938, featured 700 players and was seen by more than 10,000 people. In 1947 Lamarche directed some 1200 actors and supporting cast in his Notre-Dame-de-la-Courome (Our Lady of the Crown). Although more than 100,000 enthusiasts attended the performance, like so many others, Lamarche contributed to the vogue of playwriting in the thirties and forties without necessarily adding to the quality of theatre in Quebec.20

Actors, Directors and Theatre Companies

P P

ERHAPS THE MOST REMARKABLE feature of the Frenchlanguage theatre of the 1950s was the creation or revival of several theatre companies, often through the efforts of Father Legault's graduates. In 1951 Jean Gascon and several of his colleagues from the days of the Compagnons de St-Laurent - Jean-Louis Roulx, Guy Hoffmann, and Georges Groulx - founded the Theatre du Nouveau Monde.21 Roux, Hoffman, and Groulx directed and acted. Robert Prevost did the stage designing, replacing Robert Gadouas in 1952. In the beginning, Jean Gascon and his friends concentrated on presenting standard and classical plays from the French theatre, just as they had done when they worked with Father Legault. Claudel, Marivaux, Montherlant, Salacrou, Feydeau, Labiche, and Musset all became part of the TNM's repertoire. Moliere's commedies were the most often performed and drew the largest audiences - between 5,000 and 6,000 spectators for one play - and, in the case of Moliere's Le Thartuffe, performed in 1952, more than 20,000.22 The oppressive power and influence of the Church which had sparked the Tartuffe Affair of 1694 was definitely a thing of the past. Moliere's revenge was even greater when the Theatre du Nouveau Monde presented three of his one-act comedies in Paris in the 1955 International Art Festival. In 1958 the TNM returned to France. This time they added Le Malade imaginaire (The Imaginary Invalid) to their repertoire as well as one of Montreal playwright Marcel Dube's plays, Le Temps des lilas (The Time of the Lilacs) . On both occasions the troupe was critically acclaimed.23 25


In 1954 Jacques Letourneau, another alumnus of Les Compagnons de St-Laurent, and Monique Lepage founded the Theatre-Club.24 The TheatreClub had trouble finding a regular playhouse and perhaps for this reason, never drew as large crowds as its rival, the Theatre du Nouveau Monde, which was performing at the Gesu at that time.25 The Theatre-Club offered a selection from the comedies of Priestley, Shakespeare, Musset, Fabbri, Pagnol, Pirandello, and Roussin. It prided itself on maintaining high standards of acting and directing. Dramas such as Le Mal court (Evil Runs Rampant) by Audiberti, Caligula by Camus, and the classical tragedies by Corneille and Racine were also presented. Some of Montreal's finest actors took part in the Theatre-Club productions: Francoise Faucher, Yvette Brind'Amour, Gilles Pelletier, Francoise Lavigne, Marc Favreau, Monique Miller, Guy Godin, Jean Duceppe, Helene Loiselle, J. Galipeau, Yves Letourneau, Janine Sutto, Jean St-Denis, Lionel Villeneuve, Marcel Sabourin, Ginette Letondal, Yvon Dufour, and Georges Groulx. Many of these artists also performed for the Theatre du Nouveau Monde. In those days, as today, actors, directors, and playwrights were interested in working in the theatre at large rather than developing specific loyalties to one troupe or another. As well as attracting fine actors, the Theatre-Club also managed to persuade some of Montreal's best directors, such as Louis-Georges Carrier, and designers, such as Jean-Claude Rinfret, to work for them. Jan Doat, from France, directed two outstanding productions for the group Musset's Le Chandelier (The Candlestick) in 1955 and Shakespeare's La Nuit rois rois (Twelfth Night) in 1956. The latter play attracted more than 20,000 people.26 At the same time that the TNM and the Theatre-Club were concentrating on developing a repertoire of traditional plays a semi-professional group, the Apprentis-Sorciers decided, in 1955, to devote themselves to the presentation of avant-garde plays.27 As a nonprofit organization that charged no admission, the ApprentisSorciers relied on private donations and government grants to pay its expenses. Production costs did not include actors' or directors' fees, as none of the group's members were salaried. Although these enthusiastic young people and their leader, Jean-Guy Sabourin, worked out of converted basements, bakeries, and garages, critics praised the consistently professional quality of their work and their judicious selection of plays by some of the best modern playwrights. Beckett, Durrenmatt, lonesco, Brecht, Albee, Frisch, and Obaldia were all included in their repertoire. With an average of six plays a season, generally very 26

The Duplessis Era

well attended, the Apprentis-Sorciers contributed in a small but important way to the development of a mature theatre public in Montreal.28 The appearance of a more sophisticated audience was evident in the successful reappearance of the Rideau Vert. In the fall of 1956 Yvette Brind'Amour gathered together some of the artists with whom she had worked in the late forties and re-opened the Theatre du Rideau Vert.29 She took over a small, ninety-seat theatre, the Anjou, and began presenting, in French, a series of boulevard comedies to a regular and appreciative audience. There was no fixed schedule, so that when a play "worked," it had an extended run. Such was the case for La Magicienne en pantoufles, Louis Ducreux's adaptation of John Van Druten's Bell, Book and Candle, which played for two and a half months in 1957. The Theatre du Rideau Vert also dabbled in more serious drama, but when it did so, it performed in larger playhouses, such as the Gesu, and for shorter runs. In time, the Theatre du Rideau Vert slowly but surely established itself as an interesting and valid troupe that could always be counted upon to present a fine production of comedy or drama.30 It also employed artists who were new to Montreal theatre audiences: directors Jean Desprez, Jean Faucher, and Paul Gury, and actors Francois Cartier, Gerard Poirier, Andree Lachapelle, Benoit Girard, and Marthe Mercure. In 1960 the Theatre du Rideau Vert moved into the Stella, on St-Denis Street. Summer theatre became a popular pastime among the province's Francophones throughout the 1950s and 1960s.31 In addition to the plays produced by private theatre companies, the city of Montreal began to sponsor the Montreal Summer Festival which staged one theatrical production a year.32 Often a play would be especially produced for the festival. In 1956, for example, Jan Doat directed an elaborate production of Racine's Athalie.33 At other times, one of the local companies would perform something from its repertoire. This was the case in 1954 when the Theatre du Nouveau Monde presented three Moliere plays that had previously proven so popular: Le Manage force (The Forced Marriage), Sganarette, and La Jalousie du barbouille (The Jealous Husband).34 In 1958 Jeanine Beaubien established an off-season theatre on Ile SteHelene, located between Montreal and its South Shore. La Poudriere, as it was named, had a season that ran from March to November. Plays there were performed in four languages: German, English, French, and Spanish. Along with light comedies and suspense plays, La Poudriere also produced puppet theatre for children and mini-operas for adults. The 27


charming "old world" setting of la Poudriere helped make this theatre very popular with tourists from the United States and English Canada. As a result, the English productions, which were usually held in the summer months, consistently drew the larger audiences.35 Toward the end of the 1950s several small theatre groups sprang up, only to disappear as quickly as they had begun. Perhaps the most noteworthy and long lasting of these small companies was L'Egregore, organized by Francoise Berd in the fall of 1959.36 Until it folded in 1968, L'Egregore experimented with modern works like Beckett's Fin de partie (Endgame), Tennessee Williams's Ete et fumee (Summer and Smoke), and Dostoyevski's Une Femme douce (A Gentle Lady). In addition to and perhaps because of the appearance of a more firmly entrenched Quebec theatre industry, the fifties saw another major development in theatre in Quebec, in the form of official government recognition and financial assistance: in 1954 the Quebec government created the Conservatoire d'art dramatique, with campuses in Montreal and Quebec. The staff, both full and part-time, were drawn for the most part from Quebec's own theatre world, although French-bom Jan Doat was the Conservatory's first director. In 1957 the Montreal Arts Council, instituted in 1955 by Jean Drapeau, began subsidizing struggling local troupes like the TheatreClub and the Theatre du Rideau Vert; in 1958, the provincial government contributed to the welfare of Quebec theatre by supporting the Canadian Amateur Theatre Association, ACTA (Association canadienne du theatre d'amateur), founded, for Francophones by Quebecois actor and director Guy Beaulne, who had been involved for many years with the Dominion Drama Festival; 1958 was also the year the Canada Council handed out its first scholarships to aspiring writers and artists and gave substantial sums of money to established theatre companies such as the Theatre du Nouveau Monde. The government was soon assisted in its efforts by private and corporate funds. In 1958, for instance with the help of Dow Breweries and a $100,000 contribution from the provincial government, the actor, playwright, and producer Gratien Gelinas was able to refurbish the Gaiete to handle 1,200 spectators and subsequently to found the ComedieCanadienne. Now that this and other theatres were providing training, experience, and steady work to many local actors and directors, the development of an indigenous body of plays, could follow. In the meantime, the new, positive and financially tangible interest in Quebec's theatre activities expressed by various government and private agencies clearly demonstrated that theatre had come of age in Quebec and was at last 28

The Duplessis Era

being recognized as an important and worthwhile element of Quebec's socio-economic and cultural development. How times had changed!

Plays and Playwrights

D;

DURINGTHE FORTIES and early fifties, indigenous theatre was still scorned or simply ignored by much of the theatre public and was considered financially impossible by most directors, many of whom were running a theatre for the first time. The only form of entertainment which provided some measure of legitimacy for theatre artists was radio and eventually, television. As mentioned earlier, it was especially true in the forties, that radio provided the economic basis of survival for many writers. Gratien Gelinas, who is probably the single individual who most contributed to the creation of modern Quebec theatre, began his theatre career as an amateur actor at the College de Montreal and the Montreal Repertory Theatre but was eventually hired to play in Robert Choquette's radio serial, Le Cure de village (The Village Priest). In 1935, he recited his first monologue on radio, a revue, titled Televisemoi fa (Put That on TV or Get a Load of That), produced by Louis Francoeur and Jean Beraud. In 1937 he created his own show, Le Carousel de la gaiete (Gay Carousel), later known as Le Train du plaisir (The Goodtime Train), and his own special hero, Fridolin.37 Fridolin, a young French-Canadian street urchin, soon came to be known and loved by the Quebecois who could identify with his speech for Gelinas had chosen to have his character use the local idiom rather than the standard French that contemporary playwrights preferred. Fridolin told stories of his daily adventures and misadventures in a sometimes funny, sometimes serious, always deceptively simple and disarming fashion. Gelinas's stories singled out aspects of the Quebec community that made it unique. Some of his skits were slightly risque, and the double meanings were greeting with howls of laughter. However slowly, times were indeed changing in Quebec. Les Fridolinades effectively popularized the French-Canadian experience and was thus the first major step away from the religious and classical 29


themes that had dominated the Quebec stage up to that time. The subjects developed in his skits were closely linked to everyday occurrences and topics of conversation in Quebec and varied from modern prisons, local gossips and Bingo, to City Hall, wartime housewives, and the conscription issue.38 In addition to his writing and acting skills, Gelinas proved himself to be an excellent showman. His entertaining and poignant monologues were interspersed with dances, sing-a-longs, and instrumentals. Offstage, a number of highly skilled individuals always kept things running smoothly. Fred Barry directed, Andre Laurendeau oversaw the music, and Aime Lavoie verified the technical aspects of the shows. The revues were presented at the Monument National, which had a seating capacity of more than one thousand. At a time when most plays had no more than five or six productions, Les Fridolinades usually ran for three or four weeks, with the most popular going on for several months. Fridolin, a young boy in short pants, and a tricolor hockey sweater just like that worn by the Montreal hockey team Les Canadiens, got French Canadians to laugh at themselves and pulled at their heart strings at the same time. He was such a huge popular success that Gelinas brought him to the stage and wrote yearly revues around him from 1938 to 1946. Les Fridolinades (The Adventures of Fridolin) kept people coming to the theatre during that difficult time in history. Nevertheless, during the forties and fifties, it was mainly radio that supported local writers many of whom wrote radio dramas for the CBC which actively encouraged dramatists. Some of the most prolific writers for radio during this period were Gerard Martin, Charlotte Savary, Andre Groulx, Clement Lockquell, Anne Hebert, Yves Theriault, and Marcel Dube.39 The decade of the fifties also saw the advent of television. This new medium provided a wealth of valuable experience for Quebec's actors, directors, and writers. Jacques Languirand and Francoise Loranger both wrote several teletheatres for the French-language network, while Robert Choquette and Marcel Dube were among the most productive TV writers. More than 100 original serials and plays were produced for Quebec television from 1950 to 1960.40 Unfortunately for the development of indigenous theatre, Les Compagnons de St-Laurent which was the most active theatre group of the forties, only produced one Canadian play during their many years of successful activity - Maluron by Felix Leclerc in 1947. The companies that were founded in the wake of the Compagnon's first year of fame and glory also concentrated on a continental repertoire and did little to encourage 30

The Duplessis Era

Canadian dramatists. The Theatre-Club, for instance, offered only one Canadian play during its lifetime, Marcel Cube's Le Barrage (The Dam) in 1955 and this was a box-office failure. The Theatre du Rideau Vert's first French-Canadian play had considerably more success: Felix Leclerc's Sonnez les matines (Ring Out the Morning Service) drew more than 15,000 spectators when it was produced at the Gesu in 1956.41 Unfortunately, this sort of response was the exception rather than the rule. In spite of the unfavorable atmosphere, the works of Eloi de Grandmont, Paul Toupin, Andre Langevin, Felix Leclerc, and others were produced in Quebec between 1949 and 1958. For obvious reasons few of these writers chose to devote their entire working time to playwriting. Grandmont, for example, remained a newspaper columnist. Toupin worked as a journalist and university professor. Langevin returned to producing radio shows and writing novels and television dramas, while Leclerc concentrated on becoming one of French-Canada's best-known chansonniers. Their work is significant nonetheless, for it demonstrates the socio-political and moral attitudes of the Duplessis era, both in the themes it dealt with and the reaction of the critics and the public. Grandmont exemplifies this as well as any of the writers mentioned. Although he may be best known today for his brilliant 1968 adaptation of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion, it was a production of his drama Un Fils a tuer (A Son for the Killing) at the Gesu in 1949 that made the critics sit up and take notice of this young playwright.42 In the manner of a seventeenth-century French classical play, carefully respecting the three unities of time, action, and place, Un Fils a tuer evokes the kind of tragic situation with political overtones to which a French Canadian could relate. The hero, Jean, a young man born of French parents in New France, wishes to seek adventure on the continent instead of remaining on the family farm. His father, who has toiled to establish a decent life for himself and his family in a rugged, often hostile land, will have no part of Jean's plan which he sees as a rejection of his own way of life. Since neither Jean's sweetheart, Helene, nor his loving mother can persuade him to remain on the land, his father shoots him rather than have a "deserter" in the family. Although Jean's ambitions are the starting point of the play, it is really his authoritarian, unbending, and unfeeling father who is the central character. When Grandmont exposes him as a narrow-minded despot, and not the stern but wise paternal figure he imagines himself to be, he draws a subtle but real parallel with Maurice Duplessis's authoritarian rule. In his desperate and tragic struggle with his father, Jean thus becomes 31


symbolic of those who would attempt to break out of a society as closed as Quebec was in the forties. Two other of Grandmont's plays were performed in the fifties. The first, La Fontaine de Paris (The Fountain of Paris) was staged by the Theatre du Nouveau Monde in 1954. Then, in 1959, his patriotic comedy, Soif d'aimer (Thirst for Love), written in collaboration with Louis-Georges Carrier, was produced at the Anjou.43 Both of these works were largely ignored by the critics of the time. Brutus, the only one of Paul Toupin's several plays to be produced, was performed by L'Equipe in 1952 and at the Comedie-Canadienne in 1960. As the name suggests, this play is a dramatic version of Julius Caesar's assassination by a group of dissatisfied Romans led by Caesar's best friend, Brutus. On the whole, Toupin disregards the reasons that might have led Brutus to commit his cruel act, and ignores altogether the role Mark Anthony played in Brutus's bleak fate after the assassination. His play focuses on Brutus's emotional state after his deed. Obsessed by the fact that he has betrayed a friend, an unpardonable crime in his mind, Brutus eventually commits suicide. His solution to this personal crisis anticipates the extreme reaction of Gratien Gelinas's hero in Bousille et les justes (1959). Like Brutus who naively lies for the welfare of the state, Bousille is forced to lie and to betray God in order to save his family's honour. In both cases, the protection of moral teachings traditionally upheld by the Church was represented as being more important than any secular considerations. In 1957, in an attempt to promote Canadian plays, the Theatre du Nouveau Monde inaugurated a contest to stimulate playwriting in French Canada: the Concours d'oeuwes theatrales du Theatre du Nouveau Monde. The winning play would be performed by the company. Andre Langevin won the first competition with his politically inspired mildly successful comedy, L'Oeil du peuple (The People's Eye).44 This play is set in the main headquarters of the leader, Le Chef (The Boss), of a local reformist political party. The party executive intends to purify the masses, preaching restraint and the rejection of all pleasurable, and therefore sinful, activities. In spite of these worthy plans, everyone except The Boss breaks down the night before the election and falls into the arms of some willing partner. The representative from the town's Pleasure Committee, is relieved to learn that he can continue planning for pleasure and the photographer (the "people's eye" of the title) gets the inside story he came for. His pictures of the goings-on at party headquarters are distributed among 32

The Duplessis Era

the voters and subsequently bring about the defeat of the Purifying Party, whose headquarters will be converted into an efficiently run brothel. Langevin's implied satirical references to the 1954 clean-up campaign of Montreal's mayor Jean Drapeau and to the conservative rule of Maurice Duplessis (Le Chef) were somewhat vague but this is not surprising in view of Duplessis's repressive regime.45 Felix Leclerc enjoyed some measure of success during this period with his light comedies two of which were produced by the Theatre du Rideau Vert: Sonnez les matines, as mentioned above, in 1954 m&LeP'tit Bonheur (Happiness), in 1956. Le P'tit Bonheur was more like a revue than a play: it included a dozen brief sketches and several tales as well as songs also written by Leclerc. The action of Sonnez les matines takes place at the residence of a parish priest. Leclerc pokes light-hearted fun at the cure, a respected figure in his French-Canadian rural parish who enjoys theorizing about marriage and family until he generously and foolishly offers to mind five small children for an hour and then has to become a makeshift father for several days. The whole household soon becomes a minor disaster area, in spite of the help the cure gets from his housekeeper and the young curate. After the cure's harrowing real-life experience, he admits that bringing up a family may not be as simple as it appears. Thanks to the children, who run him ragged, he also reaffirms his belief in the saintliness of motherhood. As in most of Leclerc's humourous works there is a moral to the story: priests should be priests and mothers should be mothers, each respecting the work and particular talents of the other. In spite of their valiant efforts, none of these many writers had any individual impact on the growth of Quebec theatre. In the forties and fifties, it was only Gratien Gelinas, Jacques Languirand, and Marcel Dube who made important contributions to Quebec's playwriting and who went on to achieve national status. The work of all three dramatists reflected the nature and preoccupations of the society in which they were first produced.

33


Gratien Gelinas ELINAS WAS CLEARLY ONE of the guiding lights in ^French-Canadian theatre when there seemed to be G very little other hope of establishing permanent or original institutions. This was due in part, as we have seen, to the Fridolinades but also to his play Tit-Coq (The Cocky One). This drama was performed more than 200 times in 1948 at Montreal's Monument National and Gesu theatres46 before successfully touring the province. Gelinas codirected the play (with Fred Barry) and played the title role. He also made sure that the publicity campaign was well organized, lured students and workers to see the play with reduced prices, and lowered the price of a ticket for matinee performances as well. Tit-Coq was later translated into English and played to full houses in Montreal and Toronto in 1950. But the bubble finally burst in the United States: Tit-Coq received mixed reviews in Chicago and was a definite flop on Broadway. Nevertheless, it was made into a full-length film in 1953. Tit-Coq (1948) is the story of an illegitimate child who grows up feeling lost and lonely. The hero's illegitimacy has plagued him for years. We first meet him as an angry young man in the army who falls in love while on leave with a fellow soldier's sister. When Tit-Coq returns from the war to find his sweetheart unhappily married, he tries to persuade her to run away with him but finally gives her up when the army padre reminds him that (since there was no question of divorce in Quebec), their children would be bastards like himself. Gelinas lets the spectator draw his own conclusions as to the symbolic nature of Tlt-Coq's illegitimacy and its social implications for the average French Canadian. The fact that Tit-Coq was imbued with many traditional French-Canadian values certainly accounted for a large measure of its success in Canada and perhaps explains its failure in the United States where the audiences would not have had much to identify with. In the course of the action which takes place in a small town, in the city, and on various army sites, Gelinas manages to reveal the important role that religion and the Church played at the time in the daily lives of French Canadians for whom close family ties formed an integral part of their value system. If, in the play, Marie-Ange marries someone other than Tit-Coq, it is not only because he is absent for a long time, but because 34

The Duplessis Era

social pressures are exerted on her to marry young, thus protecting her chastity. Moreover, she is persuaded to doubt someone who has no known relatives, Tit-Coq is the only character fighting what those around him accept stoically-the Jansenistic attitude that what will be will be and that one should be thankful for what one has. Tit-Coq's lonely search for identity and his constant struggle against his social inferiority are shown to be futile and senseless. The theme of submission and the Jansenistic ideal of predestination found a particularly sympathetic audience in Quebec. Yet, in Ttt-Coq, Gelinas was indirectly attacking the Catholic leaders of French-Canadian society who thought that moral issues were either black or white with little or no grey. That Gelinas's criticism of institutional controls and the corresponding enthusiasm of his public was so discreet could perhaps also be explained by the ultra-conservative political regime that existed in Quebec at that time under Maurice Duplessis. In his next play, Bousille et les justes (Bousille and the Just) Gelinas attacks the oppression of the underdog much more violently. Bousille et lesjustes was first produced at the Comedie-Canadienne in 1959 and was later performed on numerous occasions both in English and French throughout Quebec and English Canada.47 Unlike Tit-Coq which is somewhat melodramatic, the action of Bousille et les justes is fast moving and intense. Everything in the play takes place over the space of thirty-two hours. The Grenon family (the Gravels in the English version) have come to Montreal to attend the trial of Aime (Bruno in the English version), who is accused of murdering his rival, Bruno Maltais (Marc Lepage in the English version), in a restaurant brawl. Although Aime is known to be a bully and a drunk, the family is determined to prove his innocence; should Aime be convicted and sent to prison, the scandal would be unbearable. They eventually physically force their simple-minded cousin Bousille, who saw the fight, to withhold evidence that Aime had premeditated his attack. Aime is acquitted, but for Bousille, not to tell the whole truth when one has sworn on a Bible to do so is an unforgivable sin. He commits suicide soon after his court appearance. Once again Gelinas presented the public with an innocent figure who could find no peace in this world. Bousille is a poor orphan with a weak knee and an ailing heart, a pitiful character who has always been taken advantage of but who has never hurt anyone in his life. Gelinas insists on his naivete, his deep, almost superstitious faith, and his intolerance of pain. Bousille is the epitome of the underdog. 35


Those who surround Gelinas's hero are mean and hypocritical. Aime's mother and his sister Aurore are constantly referring to God, racing off to mass, and making everyone kneel for the nightly rosary; but they are selfish and unfeeling, and chiefly concerned with keeping up the appearance of respectability. His brother Henri is a brute who insists on getting his own way, no matter how, while his brother-in-law is a weakling who knows Aime is guilty and the rest of the family devoid of moral principles, but who does nothing to stop their ridiculous and cruel pretense of goodness. These are all people who consider themselves "good Catholics." Bousille et les justes is a bitter and sadly funny commentary on a society that refuses to look squarely at its empty values and hypocritical conduct. Small-town residents maintain their lofty opinion of themselves while at the same time exploiting a weaker member of their family. The play suggests that some serious self-criticism must take place in Quebec if French Canadians are to mature and become responsible, dynamic, and forceful. Gelinas's last play, Hier les enfants dansaient (Yesterday the Children Were Dancing) appeared first at the Comedie-Canadienne in 1966 and was revived several times both in English and in French.48 In this play Gelinas dramatized, with a few comic overtones, the conflict between a father and son and ultimately between their two differing perceptions of Quebec. This time there is less physical action than in his other plays since the two main characters discuss their points of view at some length. As the curtain of Hier les enfants dansaient rises, Pierre Gravel has just learned that the Prime Minister of Canada and the Liberal Party want him to run for office and an eventual post as Minister of Justice. As luck and Gelinas would have it, Pierre's son Andre has chosen that very evening to publish a manifesto, to set off a bomb, and to give himself up to the police, ail in the name of Quebec's political independence. Andre and his father, who love each other dearly, have a long discussion on the pros and cons of Confederation. Pierre Gravel believes that Quebec is best served by the federalist system, while Andre tries to convince him that only independence will remove the colonialist yoke that weighs on Quebec. Finally, after a tearful scene in which father and son shake hands, Andre goes off to jail, hoping thus to serve the cause of Quebec's independence, while Pierre prepares to accept the government post and to tell the people in Toronto that the same problem that has divided his house will divide all of Canada if something is not done soon. Gelinas intention in this play was clearly to emphasize the human dimension of an increasingly difficult political situation: the first separatist political organizations had been formed, the first FLO bombs 36

The Duplessis Era

had exploded in Montreal, and the first part of the Laurendeau-Dunton controversial report on bilingualism and biculturalism had been published. Gratien Gelinas is considered to be the father of modem Quebec theatre, not only because of the huge success of his plays but also because he was the first successful dramatist to put ordinary French Canadians and their everyday problems on stage. The distinctive nationalistic quality of his characters is underlined by their use of colloquial French while his heroes are unmistakably French Canadians whom one can closely link to aspects of French-Canadian social, religious, and political life. In 1958, Gratien Gelinas founded and became the first director of the Comedie-Canadienne, a well-equipped hall whose main purpose would be, Gelinas declared, the promotion and encouragement of Canadian plays and playwrights. Gelinas kept his word until the theatre closed in 1970.49 Gratien Gelinas's theatre career spanned more than thirty-five years. His contribution to Canadian theatre has been officially recognized on various occasions. In 1967, Gratien Gelinas received the Order of Canada and was awarded the prix Victor-Morin by Quebec's St-Jean Baptiste Society. In 1980 the Toronto Drama Bench, composed of Canadian critics and actors, gave him a special award for his Distinguished Contribution to the Canadian Theatre.

Jacques Languirand

j

J

ACQUES LANGUIRAND'S provocative and innovative play, an absurd comedy titled, Les lnsolites (The Eccentrics) won tne Dominion Drama Festival Regional and National Award and was produced at the Gesu in 1956.50 The widespread recognition and approval accorded Les lnsolites encouraged Languirand to continue writing for the theatre. His second effort, Les Grands Departs (Great Departures) was first televised by Radio-Canada in 1957, before being produced by Languirand in Perce the following year. It also appeared several times in the United States, England, and English Canada. Languirand's absurdist work Le Gibet (The Gibbet) was performed at the Comedie-Canadienne in 1958, Les Violos de I'automne (Autumn Violins), was done as a studio production at the Theatre-Club in 1961, and Klondyke appeared at the 37


Theatre du Nouveau Monde in 1965. Of the three plays, Klondyke, proved the most popular, running for over a month and attended by more than 18,000 people.51 Although they were not always box office successes, all of Languirand's early plays won critical acclaim, and in 1963 he received the Governor General's Award for Les Insolites and Les Violons de l'automne, Much later in his career, in 1970, his English-language multi-media show, Man, Inc. (L'Age de Pierre) was chosen to open the St-Lawrence Centre for the Performing Arts in Toronto. Unfortunately, it was a critical failure. Afterwards Languirand devoted most of his efforts to producing and hosting radio and television programs. Highly imitative at times, Languirand's theatre cautiously experimented with new ideas and new forms of expression, influenced by Artaud, Brecht, Beckett, and the existentialists. The substance of Languirand's work relates only indirectly to Quebec, and his assiduous attempts at universalism suggest a certain revolt against political and cultural isolationism and provincialism. Languirand's plays often feature one very naive man and one very tough and calculating one. The women are generally unfaithful to their men, who choose not to do anything about it. Those liaisons that do exist are extreme or bizarre, for example, master-slave/sado-masochistic relationships. Along with the personality clashes and psychotic unions, Languirand often introduces an element of traditional conflict in Quebec between the proponents of two different philosophies of life: the "home bodies" and their nomadic and belligerent associates. While the lines of battle are clearly drawn, Languirand's plays do not pretend to offer a simple solution to the dilemmas of the modern world. These conflicts and clashes are particularly evident in his first play Les Insolites (1956). The spectator sees ten people brought together by chance in a bar. They include Gerard, a homeless youth just back from the war who meets his long-lost mother; Jules and his wife Brigitte who, it turns out, has had affairs with several of the men present; a strange man who uses a divining rod to seek out death; and the bartender who tries to mind his own business while listening to everyone else's. The play's atmosphere is one of riotous folly in a world where communication is impossible, death senseless, justice inhuman, and love mechanical. Languirand's disorienting style, keeps the spectator jumping from one subject to the next with little time for the development of anything other than bewilderment. 38

The Duplessis Era

In Le Gibet (1958) Languirand focuses on the naivety and frailty of his hero and at the same time stresses themes of inadequate love and lack of communication as in Les Insolties. The hero of Le Gibet (1958) is Perplex, a hopelessly idealistic character who tries but fails to break the world flagpole-sitting record. Aloft in the middle of the public square, he observes, but does not understand the comings and goings of his neighbours and his wife, Luna, Although Perplex suffers physical and emotional discomfort nobody comes to his aid; he doesn't even get an umbrella when it rains. A few lovers speak kindly to him but in general he is surrounded by meanness, dishonesty, and infidelity. Le Gibet, although absurdist, is not a comedy. There are very few amusing scenes, but a certain tension and lyricism situate the play in the realm of modern existentialist drama. Languirand's next play Les Grands Departs (1957) has more political overtones than Le Gibet but the pessimistic image of a world full of despair and malaise persists. The play revolves around Hector, an unsuccessful writer, and the various disgruntled members of his family: his wife Margot who accuses Hector of living off her and her family; his daughter Sophie who would like to leave her dreary home and seek adventure elsewhere; Eulalie, his sister-in-law, who once supported them all, and is now sickly, poor, and feeling deserted; his father-in-law who lies silent and apparently paralyzed on the floor. Surrounded by boxes and trunks, they are all about to leave their too costly apartment and are waiting for the movers to arrive. At the end of the first act, Albert, an old boy friend of Eulalie's, arrives unexpectedly and persuades her to leave with him. Sophie also leaves, purportedly to see a movie, but actually to run away with her boyfriend. Eulalie and Sophie subsequently return home, disillusioned with life and men. Both these women have fled the outside world to return to the safe, inner sanctum of the family. Their tearful reunion, however, is interrupted by the grandfather who suddenly no longer paralysed, gets up from the floor, picks up his suitcase and goes out the door, leaving everyone speechless. The surprise and somewhat absurd ending implies the departure cycle is about to begin again. It also underlines the symbolism inherent in the play's treatment of the struggle to leave the "nest." It is the healthy, relatively young members of the family who prefer to stay at home, clinging to the traditional values, rather than venturing out into the unknown modern world. That a feeble old man must show the way to freedom and adventure points out the basic cowardliness of the others and the 39


stagnant nature of the world he is leaving. Although Languirand avoids any direct reference, linguistic or other, to either Quebec or Canada one cannot help but see the implications of the morbid attachment of his characters to traditional values, and the veiled but harsh criticism of those who would grasp hopelessly to the past in Quebec, unjustifiably refusing to seek to function in the modern industrialized world. Even more bitter than Les Grands Departs is Les Violons de I'automne (1961) an absurdist, poetic drama in which the characters are called simply "He," "She," and "The Other Man," emphasizing the basic, universal nature of the story line. The plot concerns the futile efforts of "He" and "She" to consummate their marriage; they are both very old. The "Other Man" finally seduces "She" and kills "He." It is a cynical ending to this cynical love story in which physical force is shown to be the key to success in today's modern world. Klondyke (1966) is an unusual work for Languirand in that it is set in a specific time and place: the gold rush days in the West. Even here, however, he takes pains to internationalize various gold rush terms by supplying the public with a mini-lexicon. Klondyke further differs from his other pieces in that it is a musical comedy. The plot is centered loosely around the adventures of two prospectors, embodying the extremist positions we expect in Languirand's characters: one an idealist (Pitt), the other a hard-hearted materialist (Joe). They both eventually leave the Klondyke, penniless, a clear warning to the audience of the dangers of crass materialism. In ail his works, Languirand expresses definite concern with universal problems of communication and the psychological and social forces that keep people apart. At the same time his theatre cannot be totally separated from its socio-political context. On the one hand, for instance, as if in opposition to the closed society of the Duplessis era, Languirand's early plays represent a conscious effort to adopt a nonisolationist outlook on life. On the other hand, at a time when Quebec was in the middle of a modernization program, he refuses to condone society's search for "gold," material wealth, and personal happiness.

40

The Duplessis Era

Marcel Dube

I;

F QUEBEC'S MODERN THEATRE Was born with Gratien it matured with Marcel Dube. His early play Zone brought him public attention when it won first prize at the 1953 Dominion Drama Festival held in Victoria. Dube and the amateur troupe who performed Zone were showered with honours upon their return to Montreal, including an official reception at City Hall.52 Although not a particular success, on the scale of the English production of Gelinas's Tit-Coq in 1950, the English version of Zone was acclaimed by critics when it was televised by the CBC in 1956 and staged in Toronto the same year. Dube proved his worth as a dramatist with Zone and immediately became a symbol of the new indigenous theatre in Quebec. This first triumph would be followed by scores of others. In 1955 Dube's Chambre a louer (Room to Let) won first prize in the regional Dominion Drama Festival competition. Le Barrage which the Theatre-Club produced the same year, was not a critical success, but it nevertheless ran for eighteen performances.53 Two other of Dube's works were presented in 1958: Le Temps des lilas (The Time of the Lilacs) at the TNM and Un Simple Soldat Just a Soldier) at the Comedie-Canadienne. Both plays drew large crowds and ran for more than a month.54 Dube wrote steadily during the 1950s and the 1960s, and his plays formed part of Quebec's cultural life. His contribution to French-Canadian culture, the subject of many books and articles, won him official recognition by the literary community.55 In 1962, he became a member of the prestigious Royal Society of Canada. He won the coveted provincial government award, the Prix David, for his life's work, in 1973. Dube is one of the few Canadian dramatists to have succeeded in making a living by his writing talent alone. Of course, much of his writing was for the lucrative television market (over twenty-five plays) and included numerous adaptations and works in collaboration.56 Some of his television plays were later adapted for the stage and vice versa. Bilan (Statement of Accounts), for instance, appeared on television in 1960 before its production by the Theatre du Nouveau Monde in 1968. An earlier play Un Simple Soldat, first televised in 1956, was produced at the Comedie-Canadienne in 1958 and again in 1967. It was revived on the CBC French network in 1973 as part of a retrospective of Dube's works titled Le Monde de Marcel Dube. : Gelinas,

41


Most of Dube's works dramatize universal themes, (lack of communication, boredom, the individual's struggle against society) but the setting is distinctly twentieth-century Quebec. The student of Dube's plays can trace in them the socio-economic and cultural development of FrenchCanadian society through the fifties and sixties. As the province itself struggled to catch up with the rest of the world, particularly in the field of technology and industrial development, so Dube's characters fought their way up the ladders of social, financial and political success. Zone, (1953), Un Simple Soldat, (1958), Le Temps des Was, (1958), and Florence (1960) moved the Quebecois audiences with their portrayal of insecure young men and women of modest and sometimes less than modest means. During the sixties, Dube abandoned the world of poverty and degradation featured in his first plays to deal with that of Quebec's nouveaux riches. He switched to the problems of the new middle class at a time when, for the first time, many French Canadians in Quebec were beginning to enjoy the material profits of urbanization, industrialization, and economic reform. His earlier characters had used popular speech to communicate with each other. When Dube began writing about Quebec's emerging middle class,57 his characters appropriately assumed a more standard French and affected those English words and expressions that one was likely to hear in the English-dominated business world of the sixties. Zone, Dube's first major success, presents a gang of juvenile cigarette smugglers led by an older youth, Tarzan. As his name suggests, Tarzan desperately wants to be both feared and respected by the weaker mortals he controls. The young members of the gang are really children who are frustrated by the inevitability of a life of poverty. They naively tell themselves that what they are doing is not really stealing. In any case they say they will stop as soon as they get enough money to buy themselves and their family a few little things to relieve their drab existence. The gang is quickly caught, betrayed by Passe-Partout (Skeleton Key), a good-for-nothing informer who is jealous of Tarzan. The young smugglers in Zone have tried to build a dream for themselves from which they are rudely awakened by the death of Tarzan. They must now return to face the harsh reality of dead end jobs, endless poverty, humiliation, and a closed world from which there is no apparent escape. Un Simple Soldat (1958) does not paint a much brighter picture of the lot of another poor French Canadian, Joseph Latour. At the beginning of the play, Latour returns from the war to find that nothing has changed back home: his stepmother Bertha still can't tolerate him and he can't 42

The Duplessis Era

stand her; his father Edouard, as weak as ever, lets himself be pushed around by his wife, his stepson, and his boss. Joseph feels he has nowhere to go and nothing to do of any value. Even his stepsister Fleurette, who adores him, and his drinking buddy Emile, who admires him, cannot persuade him to get a steady job and settle down. The play ends when Fleurette learns that Joseph, who has gone off to fight in the Korean War, has been killed in action. He died as he wished, Fleurette declares stoically: just a soldier. Un Simple Soldat is a play about a man who cannot find peace with himself. Lack of love and education stack odds against him that he cannot overcome. He never learns to live with his shortcomings or with those of his family. Joseph Latour is in some ways a post-war Tit-Coq. Both of these heroes found emotional security only in the army and are now haunted by an inescapable loneliness. But where Tit-Coq has at least dreamt of having a warm and close family of his own, Joseph Latour has no long-term desire other than to go to war, and no place where he longs to stay other than on the battlefield. The past (the family) and the present (the City) in his own country only torment him. Although Dube soon switched to the world of the financiaily-at-ease citizens of Quebec, his theatre continued to present a black picture of a degenerate and unhappy society. In Les Beaux Dimanches (Fine Sundays), produced at the Comedie-Canadienne in 1965, the audience meets four middle-class couples trying to spend a Sunday afternoon together without dying of boredom and tearing each other apart. The host, Victor, keeps plying everyone with drinks in the hope that the conversation will keep flowing for at least a few more hours. In the meantime, his daughter Dominique comes home after having spent the night with Etienne. Although this time she slept on the sofa, the audience soon learns that she is pregnant with Etienne's child. Determined to free herself from her milieu, disgusted with the life her parents are leading, Dominique decides to abort her baby rather than have it witness their empty and depraved world. Throughout the play, Dube implies that Dominique's personal and somewhat questionable ambitions and her parents' tenacious pursuit of pleasure are the unfortunate consequences of a society whose definition of the good life is too closely linked to material well-being. Dube continues his sombre themes in Au retour des oies blanches (The White Geese), a Freudian melodrama first performed at the ComedieCanadienne in 1966. The play concerns a long-established upper middleclass family whose hypocrisy is as great as its moral standards are low. 43


The idealistic daughter Genevieve forces her father, Achilles, to admit he raped a young woman (whom Genevieve has befriended) while he was a high official in the provincial government and before he lost his job for fraudulent practices. Genevieve also gets her mother, Elizabeth, to admit that she once had an affair with her brother-in-law, Tom, while Achilles was overseas during the war. It is Tom who has just left two white geese in the front hall, inspiring Genevieve's terrible game of truth. Her game goes too far, however, and Genevieve commits suicide when she learns that her uncle, a man she adores and with whom she had sexual relations when they were hunting together, is really her father. This tragic play is yet another contribution to Dube's condemnation of the hypocrisy, infidelity, and corruption of modern Quebec. In 1968 the Theatre du Nouveau Monde presented one of Dube's most powerful and comprehensive works, Bilan. In this play Dube exposes a world in which two value systems are at loggerheads with each other: one exalts love and friendship, the other believes in money and its attendant power as the key to success and happiness. The main character, William, has amassed a fortune through hard work and much conniving. He is seriously thinking about entering politics and throws a big reception to announce his plans. The first part of the play takes place during the party and shows the guests surrounded by splendid luxury. The spectator soon learns, however, what sordidness all this luxury is hiding. William's daughter, Suzie, leaves her husband for a suave young man who eventually deserts her when William offers him a bribe to do so. William's wife, Margot, spends much of her time taking pills to calm her jagged nerves and to help her forget her wrinkles and unhappy marriage. She also tries to persuade the real love of her life, Gaston, her husband's best friend and business associate, to take her away. Their embrace is seen by her son, Guillaume, who in the second half of the play, reveals all to his father. William is heartbroken and wonders if anything is worthwhile anymore when his own household appears just as depraved and immoral as the outside world in which he has been working all these years. Dube's plays became less complicated with time, but more and more cynical. Pauvre Amour (Poor Love), presented at the Comedie-Canadienne in 1968, presents two couples who travel aimlessly all over the world to relieve the monotony of their lives. Un Matin comme les autres (A Morning Like Any Other), produced at the Comedie-Canadienne the same season, revolves around two couples who talk a lot about Quebec politics 44

The Duplessis Era

before exchanging partners for the night, Le Coup de I'etrier (One for the Road), which was produced at the Theatre du Rideau Vert in 1969, has as its hero a lonely man who spends much of his time getting drank in a bar, trying to forget his tight-lipped wife and the sorry state of the world. Through the years Marcel Dube perfected his style so that his plays ran smoothly, even when he depends on frequent changes of scenes. In the earlier plays he tends to underline his perceptions of the world with theme songs, significant gestures, and symbolic names like Tarzan (Zone] and Romeo (Le Temps des lilas}. His "middle-class" plays are full of realistic props and settings. There are plenty of drinks, pills, and cigarettes to keep everyone occupied. There is also music to dance to, soft lights conducive to numerous seduction attempts and topical but cliche-ridden topics of discussion. The world of Marcel Dube is not an amusing one, and its general atmosphere has been compared to that found in the works of Chekhov or Tennessee Williams.58 In the case of Dube, however, money and urbanization seem to be the root of most evils, either because the poor and uneducated suffer greatly in the city or because the middle classes have lost any sense of direction in life other than the pursuit of material pleasure and wellbeing. Traditional family and religious values have disappeared from Quebec. And in Marcel Dube's conservative view of the world, this is a most regrettable state of affairs.

45


Ill The Quiet Revolution: Nationalism and Quebec Drama


New Directions

F

FOLLOWING MAURICE DUPLESSIS'S DEATH in 1959 Jean Lesage led his Liberals to a sweeping victory in the Quebec provincial election of 1960 with the campaign slogan // fautque fa change (Things Must Change). In 1962 Lesage reaffirmed his popularity by winning another mandate with a new slogan, this one more overtly and self-assuredly nationalistic: Maitres chez nous (Masters in Our Own House). When Daniel Johnson and the Union Nationale finally dislodged Lesage in 1966, they continued, in a more moderate way, the reforms that Lesage and his team had instigated. The period from 1960 to 1966, during which Lesage led Quebec into the modern era, is generally referred to as Quebec's Quiet Revolution.1 The reforms his government introduced shaped Quebec as we know it today. Electricity was nationalized and economic planning boards were set up. Education, thanks to the Parent Report, was offered free to those attending secondary schools and the new Junior Colleges or CEGEPs (College d'Enseignement General et Professionnel, General Professional and Professional Education College) and curricula were revised to meet the needs of the technological age. At the same time there was growing uneasiness with the situation of the French language in Quebec. In 1961 the provincial government created the Office de la langue francaise (French Language Bureau) to look into the state of the language and to begin distributing educational bulletins on the vocabulary used in Quebec. In the early sixties, the Montreal daily newspaper Le Devoir published a series of articles by an anonymous critic who called himself le Frere Untel (Brother Anonymous). Le Frere Untel (Jean-Paul Desbiens), supported by Andre Laurendeau, the Devoir's editor, denounced the form of the French language spoken and taught in the schools. As an example of the unique character of Quebec's language, he strongly reiterated Laurendeau's claim that the current Quebecois pronunciation of the word for horse was not cheval as it was taught, but rather something like joual.. 49


The word joual soon came to designate the distinctive popular idiom of Quebec, especially of Montreal; a mixture of Anglicisms, Old French, neologisms, and standard French. The term had both pejorative and nationalistic connotations. Some felt that joual was a black mark to be erased from French-Canadian culture. Others adopted it as a flag of Quebec nationalism, a symbol of the Quebecois cultural identity.2 Everybody had something to say about it.3 In the midst of the quiet reform and self-criticism of the sixties came militancy in the form of a group of terrorists who felt that only radical action could assure Quebec and the Quebecois of a place in the sun. In 1963, the members of the Front de Liberation du Quebec (The Quebec Liberation Front) claimed responsibility for a series of violent acts including the explosion of bombs in public places. The bombs of the FLO succeeded in focusing the eyes of the rest of Canada on the social turmoil that was going on in Quebec. "What does Quebec want?" became the EnglishCanadian rallying cry during that troubled time. In 1967 General de Gaulle's famous Vive le Quebec libre drew world attention to Quebec's struggle for independence. A number of nonviolent, political groups and organizations were formed in Quebec in the 1960s to try to deal with the issue. The Parti Quebecois, a provincial political party advocating the independence of Quebec, was founded in 1968 by Rene Levesque, a brilliant former minister in the Lesage cabinet. The PO sought to obtain by democratic means what the FLQ had fought for with violence: the economic, political, and cultural sovereignty of Quebec. Nationalism had as many definitions in Quebec during the sixties as there were political organizations. Nevertheless, during this period it became a strong political force which united the French-speaking population of the province so much so that the appellation Quebecois no longer denoted only a resident of Quebec City. The term now designated the whole population of the province of Quebec, replacing the more general, less nationalistic "French Canadian." Since cultural development was becoming increasingly interrelated in Quebec to history, politics, and economics, it is not surprising that government involvement in cultural affairs also increased. In 1960, the federal government set up a co-lingual National Theatre School in Montreal, with separately administered French and English-language sections. It quickly became the most important professional theatre school in Canada. At the provincial level, the Liberals established a Ministry of Cultural Affairs in 1961 and named the well-known historian Guy Fregault to the influential 50

The Quiet Revolution

post of Deputy Minister. Georges Lapalme was Quebec's first Minister of Cultural Affairs. With the creation, in 1963, of a theatre section headed by Guy Beaulne, the provincial government began to influence, and sometimes directly interfere with, theatrical activities in Quebec. Its influence was so pervasive that some observers began to distinguish between "official" Quebec theatre and the "other," nonsubsidized one.4 In 1963 the Ministry of Cultural Affairs agreed to sponsor a new theatre company made up of students and graduates of the Conservatoire d'art dramatique in Quebec City5 The Theatre Populaire du Quebec was set up essentially as a touring company and as such was to present a standard French repertoire to theatre audiences throughout Quebec, New Brunswick, Ontario, and New England. Operating expenses were extremely high, but the government apparently felt that the TPQ's contribution to cultural exchange outside Quebec and to decentralization within the province was worth the price. In 1962 the government-subsidized amateur organization, L'Association Canadienne du Theatre d Amateur, ACTA, sponsored the first of its annual festivals in which original one-act plays were given special attention.6 Actors and directors were offered guidance from the various guest lecturers and moderators the association brought together for the occasion. In addition, with the help of government funds, ACTA began to publish a review in which new playwrights had the opportunity to publish their work. Several theatre groups and companies were formed in the early sixties, thanks to the government, some of them more successful than others. In 1962 two Montreal actor-directors, Rodrig Mathieu and Robert Singher, organized a small group of amateurs into an experimental company that called themselves Les Saltimbanques.7 These young men and women put on more than twenty-five plays in a small Montreal theatre over a period of six years.8 Their repertoire, mainly continental European and similar to that of the Apprentis-Sorciers of the 1950s, was most ambitious: Gatti, Obaldia, Wittlinger, Vian, Genet, Cousin, Schisgal, Duras, Sartre. In addition to two children's plays, a mime show, a puppet show, and two poetry recitals, the group also presented new Quebecois plays such as Equation pour un homme actuel (Equation for a Modern Man) by Pierre Moretti in 1967. Unfortunately it was this last play that was the troupe's downfall. Equation pour un homme actuel, a sensual, multi-media show, played to packed houses at Expo '67s Youth Pavilion and at the University of Montreal in 1967, before going to Quebec City's Theatre Escale and the International Youth Theatre in Nancy, France in 1968. But the fact that 51


the Expo production had been shut down by the morality squad was severely frowned upon in Quebec government circles. Upon their return from France, Les Saltimbanques no longer had a hall in which to perform ("late rental payments," said the owner) and the Ministry of Cultural Affairs decided to withhold the grant that covered the group's operating costs. Finding themselves in dire financial straits, Les Saltimbanques disbanded. One of the most stable and respected companies to be founded in the sixties was the highly subsidized Nouvelle Compagnie Theatrale. Established in 1964 by Francoise Graton, Gilles Pelletier, and Georges Groulx, the NCT's goal was the presentation of major works to the student population of Montreal. The group's repertoire of mostly foreign playwrights included Corneille, Shakespeare, Chekhov, Dostoyevsky and Steinbeck.9 From the beginning, the NCT's three or four productions a year won acclaim for their artistic and technical quality, both from the critics and from their numerous student supporters.10 The Nouvelle Compagnie Theatrale established an on-going educational program and a well-known commitment to the development of theatre in Quebec. The company held regular original playwriting contests and sponsored a workshop which encouraged new playwrights. Substantial teaching aids, research material, and informative program notes all contributed to making the NCT a dynamic, progressive theatre centre. The same year the NCT was born, the Theatre de Ouat'Sous, a much more modest enterprise, presented its first professional production, Paul Buissonneau's Le Manteau de Galilee (Galileo's Cloak).11 The Quat'Sous had been an amateur group from 1956 until 1959, appearing in a number of Dominion Drama Festival competitions. In 1964, the Theatre de Quat'Sous began presenting some of Montreal's most interesting and provocative theatre, including several of Michel TTremblay's plays. The Ouebecois started writing for the theatre in ever increasing numbers in the sixties. Moreover, they were generally far better organized and more visible than in the fifties. In 1965, for example, when the Western Quebec Regional Drama Festival ceased to exist, a group of Quebecois writers and directors, headed by playwright Robert Gurik, founded an organization to encourage playwriting and to promote production of original Quebec plays. They called it the Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques (Experimental Centre for Dramatists).12 The CEAD organized round-table discussions of new plays and, where feasible, public readings by professional actors. It began a library of all new plays received. It also published a 52


number of the plays presented at the readings and successfully encouraged other houses to publish in the field as well. CEAD also actively promoted Quebec plays and playwrights not only across Quebec but throughout Canada and Europe as well.13 Jean Barbeau, Michel Tremblay, Antonine Maillet, and Michel Garneau are only some of the many well-known French-language playwrights whose works were read, performed, published, and translated, thanks to the CEAD's initiative and influence.14 Possibly the most exciting of the Centre's public readings was that given Michel Tremblay's Les BellesSoeurs (The Sisters-in-law and/or The Beautiful Sisters) in March of 1968. The play was so favourably received at that time that the Theatre du Rideau Vert presented it in August and September of the same year. Les Belles-Soeurs launched Tremblay's career and proved without a doubt the commercial value of Quebec theatre.

Form and Content

W

WELL OVER TWICE as many Ouebecois plays were staged in the sixties as in the preceding decade.15 Jacques Duchesne, Gilles Derome, Andre Laurendeau, Roger Huard, and Roger Dumas all wrote interesting and provocative, if unsophisticated theatre during that time. Although their work met with varying degrees of success, these writers are deserving of note for their attempts at innovation either in the form or content of Quebec theatre. Jacques Duchesne was one of this period's most successful and popular experimenters in theatre form. His works, all comedies, were especially popular among young theatre groups in small theatres.16 Monsieur Florin won a Dominion Drama Festival trophy in 1951. R.I.P. was performed in 1963 by La Parabole, a short-lived Montreal group founded by Duchesne and his wife. Le Quadrille (Life as Graph) in 1964 and Les Nouveawc Dieux (The New Gods) in 1966 were Dominion Drama Festival entries. In 1966 the CEAD sponsored a reading of Ce qu'il faut savoir (What You Have to Know) and the Theatre de la Place Ville-Marie produced La Pomme (The Apple) as well as Le Beau Delire (A Fine Dream) a collection of short skits. 53


Of these plays, only Duchesne's two-act comedy Le Quadrille has been published. In a series of rapidly-moving sketches, Duchesne dramatizes the life of a frivolous woman while commenting on such socially and politically relevant subjects as police brutality, terrorist agitation, Englishlanguage ascendancy in Quebec, and sexual exploitation. His use of Brechtian techniques such as song, placards ("The Bad Bad Police,'' "Le Snack Bar," "L'American") and a master of ceremonies (animateur) was also innovative and provocative. Roger Dumas was another active playwright in the sixties. The CEAD sponsored readings of several of his works; Amourelle in 1966, Les Millionaires in 1967, and Les Comediens (The Actors) in 1968. Three of his plays were produced on the stage. Les Oiseaux perdus (The Lost Birds) was a Dominion Drama Festival presentation in March 1965. In 1968 Les Insolubtes (The Unresolvables) had a short run at the Theatre de la Place, while Les Comediens was performed at the Conservatoire d'art dramatique in Montreal the same year. Les Comediens were particularly popular among the Young Theatre groups. The bizarre dialogue revolves around the bittersweet story of a group of old people who try to make their time go a little easier by acting out a short play. Another experimental work of the times was, Gilles Derome's Qui est Dupressin? (Who is Dupressin?) produced by the Egregore in 1961. Central to Derome's piece is a series of odd conversations that take place in the garden of a psychiatric clinic. The patients spend their time analyzing each other and the absurd society that considers them abnormal More than 6,000 people applauded this play17 but shortly after its presentation Derome oriented his career toward radio and television. One other play was published, however, in 1973: La Maison des oiseaux (Bird House). It incorporates Brechtian techniques such as the use of a chorus and masks in a psychodrama that questions the nature of theatre as well as reality. Andre Laurendeau's play Deux Femmes terribles (Iwo Terrible Women) centres around two women who confront each other in a struggle over Renaud, a man whom both desire but who is never seen on stage. Although not as surrealistic as Derome's Qui est Dupressin?, it does depend to a large extent on the same kind of empty, hostile conversation found in that play. Deux Femmes terribles attracted about 1000 more spectators than Derome's piece18 but it was nevertheless considered a box office failure when the Theatre du Nouveau Monde produced it in 1961 since it could not fill their large theatre.19 The play closed after a little more than two weeks, whereas Derome's play had run for a month. After this particular failure, Laurendeau, who had previously tried his hand a little 54


more successfully at writing for television, began to concentrate on his journalistic and political activities. One final example of a Quebec writer of the sixties who sought to develop a new form of theatre was Roger Huard whose absurd plays clearly reflect Beckett, Ionesco, and Artaud. Huard's best-known play, Pile, a drama set in a fallout shelter after a nuclear war, was produced by Les Saltimbanques in 1964. None of his plays received popular acclaim. Alongside these young playwrights and experimenters, there was a group of people in the sixties who were first and foremost novelists and poets rather than dramatists but who got caught up in the playwriting fever of the decade. These include such well known names as Claude Jasmin, Marie-Claire Blais, Rejean Ducharme, Jacques Ferron, Felix-Antoine Savard, and Anne Hebert. Because of their literary background it is perhaps not surprising that, in general their dramatic writings are concerned more with content than avant garde form. Their plays deal with historical andsodologieal questions of concern to the modern Western world in general and to twentieth-century Quebec in particular. The very successful novelist Marie-Claire Blais's first stage play, Eleonor was produced by L'Estoc20 in Quebec City in 1960. Her next effort, L'Executwn (The Execution), was produced by the Theatre du Rideau Vert in 1968. Although not a commercial success, it impressed critics and was noted as one of the crudest dramas Quebec has seen to that time.21 The action revolves around Kent the young ringleader of a gang of students. This young man is cold, disciplined, admired by his classmates, and determined to commit the perfect crime. In the first act he coolly chooses his victim and prods his friend Stephane into killing him. The rest of the play examines Stephane's guilt feelings, which he is unable to reconcile with his fascination with death, the incarceration of two innocent but unpopular boys, and Kent's relentless control over the destinies of those around him. The two boys will be convicted and much innocent blood will be shed before Kent and those who follow him are stopped. The allusion to the senseless, cruel killings in the Hitler era is obvious and striking in this play. Another popular Quebec writer, Rejean Ducharme had several plays produced in Quebec. Le Cid maghane (El Cid Mangled) was performed in Montreal during the 1968 Summer Festival and in Quebec by the Trident in 1976. Ines Peree et Inat Tendu (Un-Hoped for and Un-Expected) was produced during the 1968 Montreal Summer Festival and again in 1976 by the Nouvelle Compagnie Theatrale. The Theatre du Nouveau 55


Monde presented Le Marquis quiperdit (The Marquis Who Lost Out) in 1970 and the critically acclaimed Ha! Ha! in 1978. Ducharme's plays were highly acclaimed by the critics22 but were not outstanding box office draws when produced by large professional companies. On the other hand, all of his plays as well as an adaptation of his novel L'Hiver de force (Rage of Winter) were produced in CEGEPS and Youth Theatre centres across the province.23 His youthful following was perhaps attracted by his gentle parodies of the traditional literary heroes (El Cid, Tristan, and Isolde) and historical personages (Montcalm, Vaudreuil, Levis) that formed such an important part of the Ouebecois's education system before the Quiet Revolution. Ducharme's characters do not speak the classical French one might expect, but rather a lyrical and humorous version of joual. His caricatures reveal no resemblance to old world respectability and thus prepare the way for the making of new, modern-day Quebec heroes and heroines. Jacques Ferron was another "part-time" playwright of this sixties. As well as being a medical doctor, a writer, and a politician (founder of the Rhinoceros Party), Ferron wrote well over a dozen plays. His best known play, Les Grands Soleils (The Sunflowers) was produced by the Theatre du Nouveau Monde in 1968. Although its provincial tour was very successful, it played for a month to only a moderate reception on its return to Montreal.24 A shortened version of the play was successfully produced in the summer of 1977 at the Theatre du Bois de Coulonge. Les Grands Soleils takes the spectator back to the time of one of the most crucial battles of the 1837 Rebellion in which the inhabitants of Lower Canada fought to gain control of their government. They failed, but not before a few heroes were created, one of whom was Jean-Olivier Chenier, a country doctor. In Ferron's play, Chenier knows that the Patriotes, the rebels, are outnumbered, but he also knows that this, more than anything else, will make heroes of them all. In the last act of the play, all the characters, including Chenier, who has been killed in battle, reappear to celebrate their defeat, which they believe will inspire an even stronger nationalism in the future-our present. Besides Chenier, the characters recreate other figures of French-Canadian history whom Ferron either honours or mocks depending on his assessment of their true contribution to their country. Felix Poutre, the crafty habitant (farmer) is presented as a traitor and a hypocrite. His son Francois Poutre, a Canadien errant (A Wandering Canadian) is not much more favourably portrayed as he eventually becomes a mercenary soldier in 56


Europe and Asia. The cure plays a very small role in Ferron's drama while an Indian, Sauvageau, carries the key to liberty, a newborn baby he keeps in a bag until the moment of liberation arrives, the day the sunflowers present on the stage, are apparently watching and waiting for. Although born of English parents, Chenier's maid, Elizabeth Smith, is nonetheless a strong supporter of Lower Canada's freedom, while an old drunkard, Mithridate, proves to be a wise old philosopher who comments on the action and periodically informs the audience of the historical details of the Rebellion. The technical innovations in this play are closely linked to Ferron's particular view of Quebec society and his reinterpretation of history. The events of the Battle of St-Eustache, for example, which are broadcast over a loudspeaker, is a Brechtian device used to point out the social and political implications of the play. Similar devices include the introductory prologue, Mithridate's explicit recognition of the public, the use of traditional stereotypes, and the contemporary pro-independance interpretation of historical events. In March of 1966, the Theatre du Nouveau Monde presented another play set in the Quebec of the 1830s. The only one of Felix-Antoine Savard's plays to be staged, La Dalle-des-morts, was only mildly successful.25 In this lyrical drama, Savard portrays his characters with unconcealed admiration, for they are modelled on the brave and hardy French-Canadian race of yore: the coureurs de bois (runners of the woods), who sought to reconcile their love of home and hearth with that of trapping in the dangerous and thrilling northland forest. In Le Temps sauvage (The Savage Time), Anne Hebert treats a somewhat similar theme, but she places the lyrical and traditional love of the country in direct confrontation with Quebec's struggle to break out of its long, dark age of isolation. Le Temps sauvage opened in Quebec City in 1966 and was subsequently successfully performed by the Theatre du Nouveau Monde in Montreal.26 The action takes place in the home of Agnes Joncas, an authoritarian mother who has moved far into the country in order to protect her children from any formal education. She believes that with learning comes the loss of innocence and the desire for wild adventure. Her four daughters and her meek husband submit to Agnes's rule. Only her son Sebastien does pretty well what he pleases although he realizes he must break away from his mother if he is ever to develop his talent as an artist. Isabelle, who has come to stay with the family following the death of her mother, is the catalyst, the outsider, who will effect the change in the Joncas 57


household. Four months after her arrival, the father, is looking for a job and the girls are standing up to their mother. In the final act Agnes's world falls almost completely apart around her: the neighbour's children have invaded her domain; her son decides to leave with Isabelle; her eldest daughter declares that she is going to go to school and eventually to college; and her husband no longer seems to heed his wife. Lite the larger family, the Quebec community, of which they are a part, Agnes's family refuses to remain isolated any longer from the rest of the world. The plays of all these writers reflect Quebec's struggle during the sixties to free itself from traditional attitudes and lifestyles. The work of the most active playwrights and theatre groups of this period also reflect this difficult but exciting conflict. Hebert's play, as we have seen, is one example. Guy Dufresne's Le Cri de I'engoulevent (The Call of the Whippoorwill) produced by the Comedie-Canadienne in 1960, is another. Le Cride I'engoulevent was Dufresne's first major play and his most well-known and respected work. It ran for a month when it was first produced and was revived on several occasions by small theatre groups across Quebec.27 The play begins the night before an American consultant, Mister Crowinshield, is to leave the small Quebec town where he has been working on plans for the expansion of the local spinning mill Godfrey Deschenes, a local farmer, is incensed with Crowinshield for devising a plan that eliminates the need to buy any of his own extensive land holding. He has never liked Crowinshield's smooth manner, distinguished accent, and superior attitudes, nor does he appreciate the fact that Crowinshield has worked closely during his five-month stay with his favourite daughter, Gabrielle. What Deschenes doesn't know is that Gabrielle loves the American. The young woman is the centre of Dufresne's drama. Hers is a struggle between father and lover, loyalty to the land and traditions, and her desire to move to the city with an exciting and enterprising stranger. When Gabrielle finally announces her decision to go away with Crowinshield, her father, furious, banishes them from his house. It is clear from the negative portrayal of country life (the chores, the boredom, the solitude) and from the rigid and authoritarian attitudes of Godfrey Deschenes that this play in no way defends Quebec's traditional rural lifestyle. On the contrary Dufresne shows it to be demeaning and stifling. On the other hand, the fact that the agent of modernization is an American businessman indicates Dufresne's concern in 1960 that outsiders rather than Ouebecois were profiting from Quebec's entry into the technological age. Finally, Gabrielle's determination to make her own 58


choices relates to the questions of autonomy, both social and political, which became increasingly important in Quebec during the sixties, Dufresne wrote a number of other works during this decade. Docile, a light comedy about love and marriage, was performed in 1968 at the Comedie-Canadienne, and in 1969 the Theatre du Nouveau Monde produced his Les Traitants (The Traders) a series of satiric scenes set at an inquiry held in New France into the sale of liquor to the Indians.28 These male and female dramatists were all a part of a growing corps of technically and artistically competent writers in Quebec. Nevertheless, there were four major playwrights who emerged in the sixties and whose work was highly acclaimed by both the critics and the general theatre public: Marcel Dube (discussed in Part II), Robert Gurik, Francoise Loranger, and Michel Ttemblay. Although the emphasis varied from one author to the next, these four writers all dealt with questions of tradition, modernity, and freedom which concerned not only the individual but the western world in general and Quebec society in particular. Two major issues emerge from their work: the obsolescence of the traditional form of Quebec family life; a need to establish a society which accepts an equal role for French Ouebecois in determining their province's destiny. At the same time one notes a common thread of nostalgia for "the way things were" and the peaceful rural family traditions.

Robert en Gurik

R

ROBERTGURIK WAS ONE of Quebec's most internationilly produced playwrights in the sixties and 29 seventies. Perhaps his popularity outside Quebec was related to the fact that his theatre deals with problems that are not unique to Quebec, such as the mechanical existence technology is imposing on Western man, the constant tyranny of the powerful, and the horror of a profit-minded system in which human values have no place. Those plays that do refer specifically to Quebec tend to show that what is happening in the rest of the world can happen in Quebec, and vice versa. 59


Several of Gurik's more than twenty plays were entries in the Dominion Drama Festival's regional competitions and a few were produced by little theatres at home and abroad before he made his reputation as a playwright. Le Pendu (The Hanged Man) was judged best play and best Canadian play at the Dominion Drama Festival finals held in Newfoundland in 1967. That same year the Egregore produced Api 2967. In 1968 Montreal's L'Escale performed his Hamlet, prince du Quebec. The Theatre de Ouat'Sous produced A Coeur ouvert (Open Heart) in 1969. Allo. .police! written in collaboration with Jean-Pierre Morin, was given a public reading by the Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques in 1970. In 1972 the Theatre du Nouveau Monde staged LeProces de Jean-Baptiste M. (The Trial of Jean-Baptiste M.). Gurik published several other plays but not all of them were produced in Quebec. The hero (fLe Pendu (1967), Yonel (Joel in the English version), is a poor young' 'blind'' miner who has been cured of his blindness but hasn't told anyone. With the help of his father, he devises a plan that will allow him to stop begging in the streets. There's an old saying that a hangman's rope brings luck, so Yonel will pretend to be about to hang himself (and to have used it to cure his blindness) and thus have some hangman's rope to sell as good luck charms. Yonel sells pieces of the rope that is around his neck to the president of the mine and to the local policeman, and gives away several pieces to his poverty-stricken and physically deformed friends. Business appears to be booming. He then holds a big party for his friends and customers, who come to thank him. As the gathering becomes rowdier, Yonel's intentions become clearer: rather than hang himself he wants to use his love of the poor and his experience as a Christian to stimulate other good deeds and the creation of self-help organizations throughout the world. The guests, who by now have drunk a lot of wine, will not hear of his scheme and pull the cord around his neck to assure the authenticity of their purchases. Christ-like Yonel is sacrificed for his friends. The final chorus, sung by a group of children playing in the background, tells the audience that nothing has really changed in the village and that Yonel's former friends have already forgotten him. It seems that money does not make one rich, nor do false profits (the pun is intentional) help anyone. Gurik insists that the trouble lies deeper than that: the structure of society itself, at least our capitalistic one, is the cause of man's inhumanity to man. Api 2967 (1967) is an amusing moralistic play which deals with the loss of human values through uncontrolled scientific discovery. The action 60


takes place in the year 2967 and depicts a world in which food comes in capsule form, television monitors keep constant watch on every citizen, women and men live very long lives, babies are produced in test tubes, and words that describe emotions are removed from the dictionaries for no feelings are permitted. Those who do not conform to society's rules and regulations do not survive. In this futuristic universe lives a researcher who like everyone else works for the state, and to whom a particularly sensitive collaborator is sent to help with his experiments. The subject, "E" (for Eve?) and the professor spend much time together poring over unfamiliar words they find in an old manuscript, words like "peace,'' ''kiss,'' ' 'ideals,'' and ''love.'' ' 'E'' eventually gives birth to an... apple, hitherto unknown in the world of inorganic objects. The two nonconformists accept that they must die, for they have experienced real life. Actually, we are told, death is preferable to the sterile existence such a society offers. Some of the questions related to Quebec nationalism that pervaded the sixties are dealt with in Gurik's Hamlet, prince du Quebec (1968). Gurik uses Shakespeare's play as the vehicle for a dramatization of key political events in Quebec history. Gurik's Hamlet (Quebec) tries to be faithful to his father's ghost (France's General de Gaulle). He also spends much of his time reading a book called One Hundred Years of Intjustice, wondering aloud whether it is desirable to be or not to be ... free. Each of Shakespeare's original characters assumes the persona of a real-life participant in Quebec's Quiet Revolution and subsequent events. The Queen is the Church; the King, the English-speaking community; Polonius is Lester Pearson and Ophelia is Jean Le Sage (sic}. It is Gerard Pelletier and Jean Marchand (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern) who betray Hamlet (Quebec) and Pierre Elliot Trudeau (Laertes) who finally kills the young man. The entire play evokes the image of an oppressed country which has been betrayed from within and from without. Gurik takes another futuristic look at the world in A Coeur ouvert (1969). He caricatures a group of businessmen who are in control of their country and who have under their command the heart bank from which they can get a heart any time they need a transplant. These vital organs have been obtained by soldiers, who while singing their team song to the tune of the American national anthem, cut out the hearts of those citizens who are on the undesirable list. At the moment it is laundry workers, coal merchants, and firemen who are considered to be ' 'undesirable,'' but the list can be altered by additions or subtractions as presidents and regimes come and go. There is no escaping the system. Those who resist, 61


like one of the young soldiers, will be thrown into prison and will end up eating parts of the human body, including hearts. Lite Api 2967, A Coeur ouvert dramatizes a hypothetical situation of inhumanity resulting from unchecked scientific discoveries. Gurik further suggests in this play that the master-slave relationships presented will exist as long as people continue to believe in and submit to an arbitrary system of "Law and Order." Allo...police! (1970) is a musical revue based on a series of scenes in which members of the police force are depicted as brutal idiots, whether at home, at police headquarters, or at work in the riot squad. The message is consistent throughout the play: the law oppresses rather than protects. One of Gurik's best known plays, Le Proces de Jean-Baptise M. (1972), is a bleak, though not humourless piece about our' 'democratic'' system of justice. Jean-Baptiste M. is on trial for having shot two of his bosses after they had, in his mind, unjustly fired him. The play implies that although no official reason was given, Jean-Baptiste M. was fired because he had ideas of his own and spoke up when he saw faults in the company. Jean-Baptiste M. is a Ouebecois Everyman. His surname is unknown and his Christian name, Jean-Baptiste, is that of Quebec's patron saint. The action deals simultaneously with both the past and the present. It flashes back to the different events leading up to his hero's crime, while at the same time showing a courtroom full of witnesses who are really judges of Jean-Baptiste's insubordination and acts of violence. He is judgeid guilty of disobeying society's laws and most serious of all of disturbing the established order. Coming as it did two years after the October Crisis of 1970 and the imposition of the War Measures Act, Gurik's play suggests that Canadian/Quebec society does not tolerate nonconformists, and uses the economic and legal system to victimize the ordinary citizen. Gurik's consistent, well-organized, and rational plays demonstrated the need for a pluralistic society in which it would not be a crime to be different, to be a separatist or whatever, and where charity and compassion would not be considered old-fashioned concepts. Sometimes funny, often violent, Gurik's work did not allow his public to forget what it meant to live in the twentieth century and reminded them that modern technology and social institutions were threatening the freedom of the individual and of his community.

62


FrancoiseLoranger THE THEMES OF Francoise Loranger's plays relate to T the social and moral issues of modern society. As of 1968, her work took on a strong Quebec flavour as she candidly described the political, cultural and sociological conflicts which emerged in Quebec during the sixties. Georges! Oh Georges, a one-act melodrama, was broadcast by RadioCanada in 1958 and again in 1968 with the title Jour apres jour. The Theatre du Rideau Vert produced her Une Maison,.. unjour (One House... One Day) in 1965. Encore cinq minutes (Five More Minutes), first broadcast on CBC Radio in 1966, was performed by the Theatre du Rideau Vert in 1967, by the Theatre Populaire du Quebec in 1969, and televised in 1971. Francoise Loranger's collaboration with Claude Levac in the writing of the humourous Le Chemin du roy (The Royal Road), resulted in her first play dealing directly with Quebec. This popular work was performed by L'Egregore in 1968. The Comedie-Canadienne produced the next two Loranger plays: Double Jeu (Double Play) in 1969 and Medium saignant (Medium Rare or Bloody Medium) in 1970. Although hardly funny, they were equally if not more relevant to Quebec's political and cultural difficulties. A revised form of Medium saignant, Medium saignant (Revisited) was produced by the Compagnie Jean Duceppe in Montreal in 1976 and in a Quebec Tour in 1977. Her early piece, Une Maison... unjour (1965), begins as the movers are arriving to empty a house that is to be demolished. The owner, a retired judge, does not have the means to keep the house in good repair, is too old to do the work himself, and gets no help from any member of his family. They are all too busy with their own problems, mostly marital. All the marriages are eventually saved, at least on the surface, and the old grandfather resolves to fight to stay in his home rather than die in strange surroundings. Somewhat long and involved, this play was Loranger's first attempt at representing the individual who must learn to adapt to the realities of modem-day life while continuing to maintain his or her personal dignity and autonomy. The characters defend and idealize an old-fashioned family environment. While the individual's happiness is seen to be important, the traditional values of home and family are shown to be more important still. So much so that, no matter what the difficulties or the 63


consequences involved, a semblance of harmony must be maintained. In Loranger's next play, Encore cinq minutes (1966), however, she reverses her views on the family. This work dramatizes a day in the life of a middle-aged wife and mother who fills her time redecorating her middle-class home. Finally fed up with hearing complaints from her husband and her children, sick of worrying about the room she has been trying to decorate, she rebels and announces that she is leaving home. Her family will have to learn to survive on its own, as will she. Her own development and sense of well-being are more important to her now than any empty family ties. In this play then, produced in the mid-sixties, autonomy replaced tradition as a positive goal and value. Le Chemin du roy (1968) was a complete departure in form for Loranger. It is a rollicking political satire that recreates the climate of excitement and collective euphoria inspired by General de Gaulle's memorable visit to Quebec in 1967. Here is a patriotic comedy in which men and women from Canadian public life meet in a hockey rink to play out the aftermath of de Gaulle's visit. In keeping with the concept of politics as a hockey game, Rene Levesque's ' 'goal'' is independence. His team successfully makes a mockery of Ottawa's policy and the blundering plays for unity by politicians like John Diefenbaker, Lester Pearson, and Jean Marchand. Throughout the play, the ' 'arenas''' loudspeakers keep the spectator informed of de Gaulle's procession from Quebec City to Montreal ("le chemin du roy") culminating in the famous "Vive le Quebec libre" speech from the balcony of Montreal's City Hall. Setting the action in a hockey rink, a place that is so closely linked to Quebec culture, was not only a clever device (actually suggested by Montreal's Paul Buissorineau), but also an effective way of bringing home to the Quebecois audience the concrete, cultural dimensions of the federalistseparatist political "game" that was taking place between Ottawa and Quebec. Double Jeu (1969) is not a comedy but a serious drama. It is significant both for its innovative format as well as its topical statements on the search for one's own identity. The play's characters are students attending night school to make more money, get better jobs, or simply learn more about themselves and their country. To help them ask the proper questions about themselves, the teacher gets them to act out the story of a young woman who tries to cross a river to meet a man she has seen on the other side. After many 64


harrowing experiences she finally reaches her destination, only to be spurned by the young man. He wishes to have nothing to do with her because at one point she paid her way with her body. The members of the class attempt to improvise some of the scenes, although only one, a young woman schoolteacher, manages to act them all out, including those in which she must disrobe. Her fiance is thoroughly disgusted with her, but the rest of the class provide her with moral support, singing songs as she plays out the woman's quest. Billed as a combined psychodrama and happening, Double jeu incorporated several techniques hitherto unknown in Quebec theatre. A moving picture of running water formed the backdrop of the stage and at the end of the first act the audience was asked to propose an interpretation of the various scenes. Throughout the month-long run of Double feu in Montreal, numerous spectators, assisted by the actors, played out their version of the test.30 Loranger integrated the reaction of the public into the action of the play, assigning the audience a major role in its success, and at the same time provoking in them a re-examination of questions of individual and collective concern. She also created a group of characters that were representative of all segments of Quebec society. Their personal efforts at self-improvement, their search for identity, and their need for innovation echoed the dynamics of the society at large. Loranger's next play, Medium saignant (1970) also developed the idea of participatory theatre, and used the same device of presenting social and political concerns through the microcosm of a particular community. The action of Medium saignant takes place at a town council meeting at which one pragmatic member proposes that a policy of English unilingualism be adopted. He argues that since this development is inevitable, a stop should be put immediately to the expensive practice of printing everything in two languages. It should be noted that Medium saignant was first presented only a few months after Bill 63 had been passed in the provincial legislature allowing all Quebecois to send their children to public English-language schools if they so desired. Many critics of the bill claimed that if parents, especially immigrants, were allowed to educate their children in English, it was just a matter of time before Quebec would be overwhelmingly English-speaking. In Medium saignant the pros and cons of bilingualism and of French and English unilingualism are presented in a very heated discussion between the council members and the citizens-including a cure and an Anglais. During its performance at the Comedie-Canadienne, the public 65


was encouraged to participate in this debate, which generally became more hostile as the evening wore on. By the end of each performance, everyone on and off the stage was externalizing, through screaming and yelling, ail their fears and frustrations. Most of the attacks were against the Church for its traditional and ultimately destructive advocacy of submission to authority and against the Anglophones who historically had controlled the business concerns in the province and did little to encourage the use of the French language in Quebec. In Medium saignant as in her other plays, Francdse Loranger dramatized issues that the Quiet Revolution had not completely resolved.

Michel Tremblay

F

OR MICHEL TREMBLAY, another playwright who emerged during this time, the Quebec question was very much a linguistic and economic one. Tremblay was the first dramatist, not only to write consistently in joual but also to deal explicitly with the sorry state of the Quebec working-class. His plays succeeded in establishing that the workers' problems and language were worthy of official and popular respect and recognition. When Les Belles-Soeurs was first produced at the Theatre du Rideau Vert in 1968, Tremblay's stylized use of working-class French was an immediate subject for debate.31 Never before had there been a play that used joual so exclusively and that so clearly and aggressively presented life on the wrong side of the tracks in Montreal. The language was called "vulgar" by those who reacted negatively to the crude terms used in the play and "disgraceful" by those who claimed that working-class language was suitable for the street but not for the stage. Others felt that it was time someone dealt with the linguistic and social realities of the working class in Quebec. Regardless of their personal language preferences, everyone agreed that Tremblay's vibrant use joual and his recreation of its squalid context established a new image of the Quebecois and the common linguistic bond that unites many of them. Joual soon came to be commonplace in Quebec theatre as well as in Quebecois novels and poetry. 66


The plight of the Quebec working class was harshly depicted in Ttemblay's early play Cinq (Five) first produced by Andre Brassard at the Patriote in 1966 and later revised and presented at the Theatre de Ouat'Sous in 1969 as En Pieces detachees (Fragments). It was Les BellesSoeurs, (The Sisters-in-law or The Beautiful Sisters), however, which established Tremblay as a major Quebecois playwright. Michel Ttemblay was the most successful playwright of the sixties and seventies. Les Belles-Soews was revived several times in Quebec32 and many other original plays by Ttemblay were staged in Montreal. Several of his works were first produced at the Theatre de Ouat'Sous: En Pieces detachees in 1969, La Duchesse de Langeais in 1970, A toi, pour toupurs, ta Marie-Lou (Forever Yours, Marie-Lou) in 1971, Hosanna in 1973, and Damnee Manon, Sacree Sandra, (Doomed Manon, Holy Sandra) in 1976. Tremblay's plays were very popular in the seventies throughout Quebec and English Canada. Demain matin, Montrealm 'attend (Tomorrow Morning Montreal Awaits Me), for instance, was first produced at Man and His World in August 1970 and then at the Place des Arts (Theatre Maisonneuve) in March 1972. Bonjour, la, bonjour was presented in Ottawa and several major centres in Quebec in 1974, in Toronto in 1979 and in Montreal in 1980. Forever yours was staged in Toronto at the Tarragon in 1972 and by Theatre Plus in 1975. The Compagnie Jean Duceppe premiered Ste~Carmen de la Main (Saint Carmen of the Main) at the Place des Arts in 1976. Its English version was first presented in Toronto at the Tarragon Theatre in 1978. His plays were also produced in France and the U.S.A. For instance, Les Belles-Soews was produced in Paris in 1973 and La Duchesse de Langeais appeared there, in Caens and in Amiens in 1975 and in Arizona in 1977. Forever Yours, Marie-Lou was presented in Washington D.C. in 1976, Hosanna in New York City in 1977, and Bonjour, la, bonjour in Boston in 1977 and in New York in 1980. In addition to his original work, Iremblay, did several adaptations and translations such as Lysistrata, in 1969 from the play by Aristophanes and two plays by American playwright Paul Zindel, L'Effet des rayons gamma sur les vieux gargons (The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-inthe-Moon Marigolds) in 1969 and ... EtMlleRobergeboiiunpeu (... And Miss Rearden Drinks a Little) in 1971. Several of Tremblay's works were adapted for television. In addition, Andre Brassard, who came to be considered the most sensitive interpreter of his plays, made several films based on his work. He directed 67

THEATRE AND POLITICS IN MODERN QUBEC

a television film, Frangoise Durocher, Waitress, which depicts several of Ttemblay's struggling and oppressed characters, as well as the feature film // etait une fois dans Vest (Once Upon a Time in the East End) in which elements from Tremblay's plays are also intertwined.33 Trembky's dramas about life for the East End poor of Montreal, and by extension the underprivileged Quebecois soon won him official acclaim in Quebec, where he was awarded the Prix Victor-Morin by the St.-JeanBaptiste Society in 1974. Michel Ttemblay succeeded in creating a community of characters that reappear throughout his work.34 In LesBelles-Soews (1968) we meet Germaine Lauzon, who has just won a million gold-bond stamps and has invited all the other women in the neighbourhood, some of whom are related to each other, to help her stick the stamps in the appropriate books. As the evening progresses, the women become increasingly jealous of Germaine and show themselves to be anything but the ' 'beautiful'' women the play's title refers to. They finally steal most of the stamp-filled books for themselves and flee to the sound of Germaine's desperate cries of' 'My stamps! My stamps!" as all her dreams go out the door. Ironically, of course, neither the neighbours nor poor Germaine will ever be any better off for a few gold-bond stamps cannot change one's basic socio-economic status. As the women work at gluing down the stamps, they talk about their lives, either in dialogue, in monologues, or in chorus, speaking as both members of the group and as individuals. Whatever the mode of expression, the women complain bitterly about the mediocrity and unbearable drudgery of their daily existence. Their stories are both comic and tragic: lost lovers, unwanted pregnancies, coarse and egotistical husbands, meanness, hypocrisy, and general misery. They are filled with anger and a deep sense of frustration, for they must face a world in which their only pastimes are playing bingo and gossiping. At the end of the play, nothing has changed except perhaps the audience, forced to take note of a deprived society where simply surviving is an accomplishment. The theme of survival was also evident in the Theatre de Quat'Sous's production of En Pieces detachees (1979). The action of this play takes place in three localities: the restaurant, where the main character, Helene spends her day listening to the customers or to the other waitresses complaining; the street, where we see two men walking around wearing sandwich-boards, just as Helene's husband, Henri had done before he stopped work because of an accident he claims to have had; the living 68


room, where Helene's mother and daughter, Robertine and Francine, watch television with Henri and wait for Helene's return. When Helene does return home, she is drunk. The ensuing fight with her mother is normal for her when she is in this state, so a neighbour informs the public. This neighbour, the backyard gossip, sits at her kitchen window just waiting for something to happen that will distract her from her own miserable life. Her monologues between scenes keep her husband (whom we never see) and the spectator up to date on Helene and her family. The play ends when Helene's insane brother Claude, who had escaped earlier from a mental asylum to visit his family, is taken back to the hospital. The rest of the family confess their inability to get out of the rut they are in. In En Pieces detachees, Ttemblay once again exposed the alienation, mediocrity, and despair of the working class world. This time there was no laughter at all. En Pieces detachees was revised and televised by Radio-Canada in 1971 and again in 1972; names were changed and, more importantly, several scenes added which make the symbolic nature of the story line more explicit. For example, the vitality and brutal social commentary of this version are conveyed through the introduction of a whole courtyard of gossipy females who have replaced the lone neighbour. In 1970, the Theatre de Ouat'Sous presented La Duchesse de Langeais, a dramatic monologue which features an aging homosexual. He calls himself the Duchess of Langeais because he has always dreamed of dying as a Carmelite nun, like Balzac's heroine of the same name. His homosexual identity has become so much a part of him that he now uses the feminine pronoun referring to himself. We meet the Duchess on a beach in Mexico where she is drinking and trying to forget the young man she loves who has just left her. She is not only heartbroken, she is upset that after all these years of breaking other men's hearts, someone has dared break hers. When she recalls her former nightclub act, the Duchess speaks a continental French, which is considered by some Quebecois to be effeminate. When the Duchesse is herself, it Is joual, a man's language, that she uses to express her inner self. The comic contrast in levels of language reinforces the sexual confusion of the Duchess's identity, which Tremblay uses as a metaphor for the confusion of the collective Quebecois identity. The Duchess's ribald stories of earlier days when ' 'all of Montreal'' was at her feet are in sharp opposition to the state of desperate loneliness in which she now finds herself. This time the contrast between the glorious past and the unbearable present is equally symbolic but much more pathetic. 69


Next to Les Belks-Soeurs, A toi, pour toujowrs, ta Marie-Lou, which was first produced in 1971, was perhaps Tremblay's most popular play outside Quebec. In 1975, for example, it was produced at the Citadel Theatre in Edmonton, by Theatre Plus in Toronto, and at the Vancouver Cultural Centre. The play opens when Carmen, who sings cowboy songs in a cheap bar in Montreal, comes to visit her sister Manon, a spinster, who has lived alone since the death of their parents in a car accident ten years before. Sitting in the kitchen, at centre stage, the two women talk of their childhood at home. The dead parents, meanwhile, are also present on stage, and their dialogue parallels and complements that of the sisters. The parents the spectator sees on the stage are the ones Carmen and Manon knew ten years earlier. They address each other from opposite sides of the stage in the time frame of the past, while Carmen and Manon remain in the present. The parallel dialogues are a clever device that stresses the traumatic influence of one generation on the other. The parents' constant bickering has traumatized Carmen and Manon. Ten years after their death, Manon can't forget the past. She also keeps coming back to her parents' accident which she believes was really a murder-suicide. Several scenes in the play, notably the one in which Leopold admits to himself that there is no way out of the emotional and financial mess they are in, seem to corroborate her theory. Manon now spends her time feeling sorry for herself, praying for the father she hated and the mother she pitied, and surrounding herself with religious symbols, the way her mother had done. Carmen, on the other hand, refuses to let her parents' problems ruin her life. While the club she sings in on "The Main" (St. Laurent Street in Montreal) is not exactly a showcase for quality entertainment, Carmen has at least attempted to escape from her stifling past. As for Leopold and Marie-Louise, they seem to have lost forever the happiness they knew before they were married, when Marie-Louise gave Leopold a family photo signed ' 'Forever yours, Marie-Lou.'' The only time that the nickname ' 'Marie-Lou'' was used after that is the fateful day Leopold asked his wife and their young son to go for a ride in the car. Tremblay's powerful and unique dramatic quartet dramatizes the psychological and physical horrors of ignorance and poverty and their implications for a family and a society whose members become disheartened, frustrated, and neurotic in their alienation from each other. Carmen's desire and determination for change are the one glimmer of hope in this sordid universe. 70


The coarseness and ugliness of life in Montreal's underground bars and cabarets are also the subject of another of Tremblay's plays, a musical comedy entitled Demain matin, Montreal m'attend (Tomorrow Morning Montreal Awaits Me), which was first produced at Man and His World in 1970. The heroine is a young woman, Louise Tetrault, who has won a trophy in a provincial singing contest and who hopes to further her career with the help and support of her sister, Lola Lee, a night club singer. But Lola Lee is horrified at the idea of her younger sister following in her footsteps. To persuade Louise that this is not a life for an innocent girl, she takes her around after her show to meet some of her "chums": alcoholics, homosexuals (including the Duchess), and perverts, all mean and unhappy Louise cannot be deterred from her desire to become a star, however, and in the final scene we see her literally competing for the spotlight with Lola Lee. She apparently believes that no matter what others might think, she belongs in the world of bright lights and false hopes. Ttemblay again studied the grey world of sexual aberrations in Hosama (1973). Hosanna is the name that Claude, a practising homosexual, has taken. His lover Raymond, who likes to cultivate his image of a tough cyclist, also uses another name, Cuirette meaning "leatherette," thejoml pronunciation also suggesting the English sound ' 'queer.'' Hosanna is upset because he had hoped to win first prize in a costume party for his imitation of Elizabeth Taylor, his lifetime idol, in her role as Cleopatra. Unfortunately, when he arrived at the transvestite club where the party was being held, he discovered that everyone else had come as Cleopatra too: his "friends" had decided to play a joke on him. Now he is home, in the cheap apartment he shares with Cuirette, tearfully taking off his makeup and carefully handsewn dress. Cuirette gets fed up with quarrelling and drives off on his motorcycle to meet Sandra, another aging homosexual like himself. Several hours pass but he finally returns home. Hosanna and Cuirette then make up, shed their verbal masks as well as their clothes and admit that although theirs is not a conventional relationship their love for each other is real and should not be denied. Hosanna is not a humorous play although there are a few vulgar references that can provoke laughter. The plot does appear somewhat grotesque at first, but the love drama is both real and poignant. Moreover, apart from the basic love story plot, the play could also be a parable of the ambiguous and contradictory nature of Quebec culture and the collective need of the Ouebecois to accept themselves as they are, to stop wearing masks and pretending they are someone or something else. 71


Ttenblay again gave his characters distorted sexual norms in Bonjour, la, bonjour (1974). The play deals with the incestuous relationship between Serge and his sister Nicole and Serge's attempt to justify his way of life to his aunts and other sisters. At the end of the play he decides, in spite of their possessive love of him—or perhaps because of it-to move in with Nicole and to invite his poor deaf father to live with them. Nicole and his father are the only two people he really cares about and it doesn't matter what other people think, including his siblings. Besides, from what Serge has seen of his sisters' sordid and unhappy lives, his life with Nicole can be no worse than the ones they lead. At least he and Nicole love each other and they both love their father. In Bonjour, la, bonjour as in A toi, pour toujowis, MMarfc-LouliemHay uses the technique of complementary simultaneous dialogues. This time, however, the protagonist, Serge, moves back and forth between the members of his family so that the present and the past, the personal and the collective, are seen as vitally interwoven. Demain matin, Montreal m'attend, Hosanna, and Bonjour, la, bonjour all end with the main characters deciding to accept the way of life that best suits them. Tremblay's message to his fellow Quebecois was that it was not important what others think or what type of lives the protagonists lead. What was important was that they be what they were, honestly and courageously. It was perhaps this essentially universal theme which attracted audiences throughout North America and Europe to Tremblay's plays. We return to Ttemblay's stage family in Ste-Carmen de la Main (Saint Carmen of the Main) which was first produced in Montreal in 1976. The heroine of the title is the same country and western singer we first met in Al toi, pourtoujours,ta Marie-Lou. This time Carmen has just returned to Montreal after a six-month training period in Nashville, Tennessee. Her return is greeted with joy by a chorus of whores and transvestites who lavishly praise her performance and her lyrics. Carmen believes her songs about the people of "the Main" can lift spirits and help her downtrodden friends to rise up in anger and fight for a better life. However, Maurice, her hard-nosed boss, orders her to stick to entertaining his customers and to forget about trying to educate them. Tooth-pick, Maurice's hatchet man, is jealous of Carmen's success and, in any case, has hated her ever since she ridiculed his masculinity. He finally shoots and kills the rising star. Carmen thus becomes a martyr for the cause of the people, a "Saint" and a compelling addition to Tremblay's long list of tragic figures from Montreal's East End. 72


In Damnee Manon, Sacree Sandra (1976) Tremblay examined the dreams and aspirations of Carmen's sister Manon and of one of her transvestite admirers, Sandra. Manon is even more of a religious fanatic than when we first met her in A toi, pour toujours, ta Marie-Lou. She has just bought herself a gigantic pair of wine-colored rosary beads which she fondles passionately while conjuring up images of Christ, the Virgin Mary, and various masochistic sacrifices she has made for God in the past. While Manon becomes increasingly aroused and hallucinatory, Sandra sits quietly before her mirror, covering himself with green lipstick and nail polish, inventing sexual games to play with his black boyfriend Christian, and planning his next outrageous disguise as the Virgin Mary. Since Manon never speaks to Sandra she never realizes that her neighbour is really a childhood friend and favourite cousin, Michel. Although both individuals have obviously gone their separate ways since their youth, they have become equally frustrated and degenerate, on both the religious and the sexual level. The difficult search for some sort of spiritually satisfying experience, whether it be political, religious, or sexual, is a recurring theme in modern Quebec theatre, and the dominant message of Tremblay's work.35 In all his plays of the sixties and seventies, Tremblay sought to point out and denounce the social and cultural failings of a repressed and frustrated minority. His work also defended the right of the Quebecois to seek a better material and cultural role in the modern world. This attitude was quite a change from Marcel Dube's, for instance, who considered money and materialism to be an alienating consequence of the industrial age and the modernization of Quebec. Michel Tremblay's Quebecois were not the dissatisfied middle-class victims of Dube's world, but rather hard-working, long-suffering working-class people who did not benefit from the capitalist society, and remained alienated within that society. His view of the Quebec community would inspire a whole generation of writers and actors in the seventies.

73


IV Theatre in Modern Quebec: Permanence and Change


Expanding Horizons

A;

LTHOUGH THE POLITICAL agitation which began in the early sixties spilled over into the seventies, it did not dominate this particular decade as it had the previous one. In fact, the nationalist fervour which on occasion bordered on rebellion was diffused in the early seventies in many ways by the emotional backlash created by the October Crisis of 1970. The violence imposed by the Front de Liberation du Quebec on British diplomat James Cross and Quebec politician Pierre Laporte shocked many Quebecois. In addition, the imposition of the War Measures Act convinced many activists of the ability of the federal government to successfully fight force with force. As a result, the FLQ lost its claim to respectability and the associated prestige and striking power. Soon after the October Crisis, student and union protest marches, radical nationalism and the like became far less prevalent in Quebec. Instead, union organizers, student leaders and even former radical intellectuals like Pierre Vallieres rechannelled their patriotic fervour and threw their support behind the parti Quebecois (PQ) which promised to fight for political independence through peaceful and democratic means. Nationalism was further defused during the provincial election of November 1976 when the PQ successfully ran on a platform of honest and efficient government1 and postponed the debate on separatism to a later date. Within a year, after the election the PQ government had passed Bill 101 which made French the official language of education, law, and business in Quebec. This new language law at least temporarily disposed of what had been a major cause for political activism for over ten years. With the PQ in power and with Quebec an officially French-language province, it was perhaps not suprising that in the referendum of May 1980 a majority of the eligible francophone electorate in Quebec voted against the proposed option of political independence coupled with economic association with English Canada. Political independence was obviously not considered to be the most urgent need of the day. Some would argue that less abstract social and economic questions were of W

77


far greater concern to the average Quebecois. Others claim that the multidimensional nature of modern Quebec encouraged its citizens to be more concerned with their own individual needs and ambitions than with those of the community as a whole. Whatever the case, the population collectively took a deep breath and settled in to lick its wounds and get on with the job of running the province. An ultimate beneficiary of this desire to reconcile Quebec nationalism and nonviolent social reform was the theatre. Several new theatre spaces were made available to the numerous theatre groups and writers that appeared in Quebec after 1970. In 1971, the Nouvelle Compagnie Theatrale began sponsoring workshops and young theatre productions in the Salle Fred-Barry, a new hall adjacent to the company's own theatre, the Salle Denise-Pelletier. In 1973, the Centre d'Essai le Conventum announced its willingness to house multidimensional experimental productions and to encourage the development of theatre for the people.2 Of all the new playhouses which began operating in Quebec during this period, however, the opening in 1970 of Le Grand Theatre du Quebec was one of the most significant, for this was the first major theatre established outside of Montreal. Here was clear evidence that theatre had become a more generalized and integrated aspect of Quebec cultural life. A new professional company, Le Trident, also founded in 1970, began using the facilities of Le Grand Theatre on a regular basis.3 The Trident grouped together diverse elements from Quebec City's smaller theatrical groups, notably actors and technicians from the Theatre de 1'Estoc, the Theatre pour Enfants de Quebec, and the Theatre du Vieux Quebec. Paul Hebert, the company's first artistic director, began the 1970-1971 season appropriately enough with a play by Jean Barbeau, a new playwright who made his home not in Montreal but in Quebec City. Bingo or 0-71 attracted more than 6,000 spectators and was considered a modest success.4 The parody that followed, Molwrepop by Jean-Marie Lemieux, just barely held its own at the box office but the group's third production, Charbormeau et le Chef a translation of John Thomas McDonough's play Charbormeau and Le Chef, quickly stilled any worries the company's administrators might have had as to the Trident's viability. More than 11,000 Quebecois5 turned out to see Jean Duceppe and Jean-Marie Lemieux confront each other as Maurice Duplessis and Archbishop Charbonneau during the 1949 Asbestos strike. The theatre year ended with a children's play, Faby en Afrique by Raymond Bouchard, attended by more than 6,000 young people.6 The seasons that followed 78

Theatre in Modern Quebec

continued to offer something for everyone: children's theatre, original Quebec plays and translations of Canadian, American or European plays. Most were well attended and enthusiastically applauded. The Trident was soon recognized throughout the province as an established professional company, on a level with Montreal's permanent companies. The expanding popular appeal of theatre in the seventies was evident in the successful introduction of cafe theatres throughout the province. In both Montreal and Quebec City, theatre clubs regularly presented interesting and exciting dramas and comedies. The Ex-tasse, the 4-Saouls bar, the Cafe Nelligan, and the Cafe de la Place of Montreal as well as the Theatre du Vieux-Ouebec, the Cafe Rimbaud, and the Petit Champlain in Quebec City7 were the most active in this category. With a seating capacity for no more than 200 people, they served food and drinks along with a varied fare of original works and collective creations as well as standard Quebec and European classics. In the 1978-1979 season, for instance, the Theatre du Vieux-Quebec presented a collective feminist work, Le Fleuve au coeur (A River in the Heart), a cabaret-style revue, Le Cabaret quipouffe (A Poofy or Overblown Cabaret), a translation of John Herbert's Fbrtune and Men's Eyes, Awe Yeux des hommes, four short plays by Marie Laberge, performed as Profession je I'ame (I Love My Profession) and an original drama by Rejean Vigneault, Cheval defer (Iron Horse). These and other productions were enthusiastically received by the regular patrons of Quebec's cafe-theatres. The extent of theatre's penetration into Quebec society was further evidenced by the prodigious growth of theatre for youth and children in the seventies.8 The Nouvelle Compagnie Theatrale continued to serve the teenagers and young people of Montreal while many new youth theatre groups operated out of cafe-theatres and CEGEPs throughout the province. Established professional companies such as the Theatre du Rideau Vert, the Theatre Populaire du Quebec and the Trident all put on children's shows two or three times a year. Perhaps more importantly, several dozen troupes were formed with the express purpose of producing fine theatre for children of all ages. In 1974, the first Festival of Children's Theatre in Quebec was held in Longueuil, across the river from Montreal.9 The Festival, organized by the Association quebecoise du jeune theatre (AOJT), quickly became an important annual event. Participants generally presented collective pieces and classical works as well as original plays by Quebecois writers like Raymond Bouchard, Andre Caillou, Roland Lepage, and Marcel Sabourin. 79


Monique Rioux's La Marmaille (founded in 1973) and Jean-Yves Gaudreault's Theatre des Pissenlits (founded in 1968) were perhaps the most active of the children's companies. They were certainly the best known outside Quebec. In 1979, for instance, La Marmaille was invited to perform a collective work On n 'estpas des enfants d'ecole (We're Not School Children) and organize workshops in West Berlin schools. That same year, the Theatre des Pissenlits, which had toured extensively in Quebec, English Canada, and the United States, performed GuStver's Travels in three cities of the USSR and opened the First International Festival of Children's Theatre in Geneva, Switzerland. During the seventies, an increasing number not only of children's groups but adult theatre companies were invited to perform outside North America. France was particularly appreciative of Quebec's actors and directors. In 1977, for example, The Theatre Experimental de Montreal was invited to the World Theatre Festival in Nancy. In 1978, L' Organisation 6, Les Gens d'en bas, and the Theatre de la Riposte presented collective works in the Paris suburb of Sevres. In 1979, the Theatre de 1'Avant-Pays took part in the World Puppet Theatre Festival held in Charleville-Meziere. In addition to its theatre groups, Quebec dramatists were becoming increasingly well-known in France. In 1975, the Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques organized a tour in France (Paris, Caen, Amiens) and presented the works of several Quebec dramatists: Jean Barbeau, Michel Gameau, Jean-Claude Germain, Robert Gurik, Marie-Francine Hebert, Serge Mercier, Andre Simard, and Michel Tremblay. Thanks to this initiative, and a similar one in 1976,10 Quebec plays became a regular feature at the Avignon Summer Festival, thus giving even Further exposure to Quebec theatre and playwrights such as Michel Tremblay (La Duchesse de Langeais, 1977), Jean Barbeau (Solange, 1975), Michel Gameau (Quatre a Quatre, 1977), Serge Mercier, (Encore un pen, 1975), and Roland Lepage (Le Temps d'une vie, 1977). A further contributor to the knowledge and prestige of Quebec theatre outside Canada was the creation, in 1979, of the Quebec wing of Canada's International Theatre Institute, a UNESCO agency. The Centre du Theatre quebecois comprised several Quebec theatre organizations: the Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, the Societe des Auteurs, the directors of the revue feu, the Association quebecoise du jeune theatre, the Unions des artistes and the Association des directeurs de theatre. The Centre's main purpose was the promotion of Quebec theatre on an international scale. It also sent representatives, along with its English-language colleagues, called the Canadian Centre of the International Theatre Institute, 80


to various international congresses. This sort of activity was indicative of the growing international prestige of Quebec theatre.11

Revolutionary Theatre Groups

A

N INTERESTING DEVELOPMENT in the late sixties and Jnto the seventies was the appearance of several theatre troupes who performed more from a missionary zeal than because of any desire for artistic recognition. Although these performers devoted the majority of their time to the theatre and accepted money for their efforts, becoming part of the established, institutionalized theatre world was not one of their aims. On the contrary, in the same way that dramatists of the sixties wrote politically inspired plays, these troupes sought not only to inform and entertain their public but also to politicize the spectators to such an extent that they would eventually undertake to radically reform society. The audiences of these groups were often composed of students. However, they would also frequently perform before small numbers of workers, women, children, or farmers, depending on the particular cause which was being presented. Because of the social nature of their productions, large playhouses were rarely used by these young actors who preferred to perform in Church basements, school cafeterias and gymnasiums, central squares, shopping centers, and other public places. After the show they would meet with the public to discuss the problems they had dramatized. Because costumes and scenery were necessarily kept to a bare minimum, each prop acquired much more importance than in traditional theatres and was used in a variety of imaginative ways. As the working classes were often the subject of the productions most of the actors spoke working class Montreal French (jouat). Rural accents and vocabulary as well as various levels of standard French were used when warranted by the subject matter. These troupes completely ignored the traditional structure of theatrical presentation for both the administration and artistic aspects of a production. For instance, their young members thrived on working within small, femilylike groups where everyone shared in collective responsibilities and rewards. 81


All the actors in these groups actively participated in the creation of each show which was generally referred to as a creation collective (collective creation) rather than as a play. The actors thus became co-authors of the final production although their efforts did not always result in a written text. Often the final "script" would consist of a series of stage directions, subject headings, role designations, and whatever else would indicate the general structure of the production while allowing for the improvisations of the actors. Improvisation was the essential characteristic of their creative process. The actors would usually begin by improvising on a general theme decided on by the group. A rotating ' 'observer'' would take notes during this time which would serve later as the basis of more precise themes and techniques. Sometimes, one particular actor would be designated the ardmateur of the group and would have the job of noting the best improvisations and of making suggestions for changes and additions. On other occasions the group collaborated with a full-time writer who would agree to write a text based on the improvisational sketches developed in the workshops. Many of the groups chose not to request any government subsidies on the grounds that such financial support implied direct or indirect government control and would therefore interfere with their revolutionary goals. Several troupes eventually did accept government monies, however. The sources included the different Cultural Affairs agencies and the Labor and Social Welfare Ministries who seemed willing to acknowledge the educational and social importance of the work being done by the several hundred young people involved in this theatrical enterprise. The popularity of the movement spread so rapidly that by 1974 more than 1500 actors/writers and over one hundred groups were presenting collective creations across the province.12 The first of these troupes to have a significant impact was the Theatre du Meme Nom for whom the writer Jean-Claude Germain agreed to be the principal co-ordinator and animateur when it began producing collective creations in 1969. The TMN's theatrical strategy, was, to parody and ridicule the cultural and political elite of the province so to destroy the esteem in which they were held by the populace. Even the initials of its name indirectly poked fun at the so-called establishment company, the TNM, the Theatre du Nouveau Monde. Between 1969 and 1971, Germain and the TMN, or "Les Enfants de Chenier," as they were also called, (Chenier's Children; Chenier was an heroic leader of the 1837 Rebellion), co-produced several shows including 82


LesEnfants de Chenier dans un autre grand spectacle d'adieu (Chenier's Children in Another Great Farewell Show), Diguidi, Diguidi Ha! Ha! Ha; (Diguidi is a nonsense word that evokes the idea of tickling), Si Aurore m 'etait contee dewcfois (If I Heard About Aurore Twice), Rodeo et Juliette, La Mise a mort d'la miss des miss (The Miss of Misses is Put to Death), Les Tburteraux (ou la vieillessefrappe a I'aube) (The Turtledoves or Old Age Strikes at Dawn), Si les Sansoucis s'en soucient, ces Sancoucis-ci s 'en soucieront-ils? Bien parier, c'estse respecter (If the Non-Worriers Worry, Will These Non-Worriers Worry? To Speak Well Is To Respect Oneself), and Le Roi des mises a bas prix (The King of Cut Rates).13 Most of these shows were first presented at a small, second-floor theatre in East End Montreal, the Theatre d'Aujourd'hui.14 Their first work, Les En/ants de Chenier, was billed as a liquidation sale of all the old stock in the Quebec theatre store. With Germain's help, the six permanent members of the troupe, Jean-Luc Bastien, Louisette Dussault, Odette Gagnon, Nicole LeBlanc, Gilles Renaud, and Monique Rioux, all former students of the Ecole Nationale de Theatre, ridiculed and rejected traditional theatre plots and formats and denounced the preponderance of classical and foreign writers (Euripides, Racine, Claudel, Shakespeare...) in Quebec's official culture. Their subsequent shows, in which each actor portrayed various figures in Quebec's culture, satirized the province's religious, social, political fetishes and anomalies. SiAwore m'etait conteedeuxfois, whose starting point was Aurore, a melodramatic, saintly heroine of stage and screen in the thirties, was a series of burlesque-style sketches about Quebec's traditional value system. La Mise a mort d'la Miss des Miss, which was actually part two of. .SiAwore, used stock devices of vaudeville comedy to more overtly satirize the social and political institutions of the Duplessis era. Diguidi, and Si les sousoucis s'en soucient, ces sancousis-ci s'en soucieront-ils? Bien parier, c 'est se respecter contain many clever, witty, and biting parodies of Quebec's social and judicial system. Bien parier, c'estse respecter placed next to a tongue twister in the title like "Si les Sansoucis," was directed towards what the TMN felt to be typical shortsighted government policy such as Bill 63 which they claimed had denied the linguistic and social realities of Quebec culture. Contrary to the other productions of the TMN, Les Tburteraux and Le Roi des mises a bas prix focused on one or two central characters and followed a definite story line. They were, however, consistent with the TMN's goal of exposing the social ills of the time and were particularly critical of those who would ignore the plight of the working class 83


(Le Rot) or the struggles of political minorities (Les Tburteraux}> The Theatre du Meme Nom's consistent efforts to relate theatre to its social and political context served as a model throughout the seventies for many other young theatre groups interested in developing a popular theatre. One group which, had perhaps an even greater influence on the creation of a popular aesthetic than the TMN was the Grand Cirque Ordinaire. It was founded following a protest in 1965 by former students of the Ecole Nationale de Theatre (ENT), Suzanne Garceau, Paule Baillargeon, Guy Thauvette, Jocelyn Berube, Claude Laroche, Gilbert Sicotte, and their unofficial spokesman Raymond Cloutier. These young people had strongly criticized the fact that the school's program was dominated by imported works and methods and excluded Quebecois material. Then in the fall of 1969 they joined several former students of the ENT, MarieJosee Lippens, Marie Bedard, Helene Prevost, and Jean-Pierre Roy to found Le Grand Cirque Ordinaire.15 That same year, Albert Millaire, the artistic director of the governmentsponsored touring company, the Theatre Populaire du Quebec, invited Raymond Cloutier and other members of the GCO to tour Quebec for one month with the collective creation, T'espas tannee, Jeanne d'Arc? (Aren't You Fed Up, Joan of Arc?). This show proved so successful, it continued its tour for an additional four months, eventually being performed more than 175 times before more than 100,000 Quebecois in centres across the province.16 The group's 1970-71 tour, again sponsored by the Theatre Populaire du Quebec, included three other popular collective creations, La Famille transparent (The Transparent Family) (sixty shows), La Soiree d'improvisation (An Evening of Improvisation) (fifty times), and Alice au pays de sommeti (Alice in Sleepyland) (forty performances).17 As in the case of the TMN, the GCO's members had a close working relationship and shared in the production of their collective creations. They also held improvisational workshops although improvisation was not only used to develop the themes and structures of their shows but also continued to play a role in the productions themselves.18 Germain and the TMN had sought to demystify many of the traditional concepts and figures of Quebec's culture. Raymond Cloutier and the GCO used traditional figures and types in allegories which were meant to educate the people as to the cultural but also the economic and political exploitation they were being subjected to. Jeanne d'Arc, a political and social satire, which made frequent parallels between historical facts and contemporary events situated Joan of Arc's story in modem-day Quebec, and her trial 84


before whitefaced, looming figures that represented the English, the Law, and the Church. The GCO took its source material directly from the daily lives of the Quebecois while getting thousands of spectators, many of them new to the theatre, to laugh, sometimes wryly, at Quebec's trials and tribulations. The company's shows included jigs and square dances and generally borrowed from popular forms of theatre such as vaudeville, music-hall, and the commedia dell'arte. The ' 'Great Big Ordinary Circus'' also based many of its techniques on the circus model, a genre well suited to its desire to establish a popular theatre which would reach mass audiences. Sometimes, the group would parade through a community before a performance, doing short improvisations and skits along the way. Some of their favourite devices during a production included fast-paced action, directed by a central figure or ringleader, simultaneous activities, giant puppet figures, clowns, acrobats, and unusual effects of sound, light, and colour. All their techniques not only entertained the spectators who would applaud long into the night but also created a Brechtian atmosphere in that they frequently gave a critical ironic edge to their dramatizations of the social, political, and cultural struggles of the Quebecois. This was not approved of in government circles. In March 1971 Albert Millaire was asked to give up his position as head of what some government official considered the far too notorious Theatre POpulaire du Quebec and its infamous touring collective, Le Grand Cirque Ordinaire. In November 1971 the GCO visited Pibrac, a small town in the Lac Saint-Jean region and created T'en rappelks-tu Pibratf (Do You Remember Pibrac?), based on the lives of the workers of this northern town which had a ten year history of mass unemployment. The troupe used a recent mass uprising of the population and its subsequent repression by municipal authorities to allegorize the cultural repression of all Quebecois. The show was performed thirty-four times and enthusiastically applauded before being stopped by the Ministry of Cultural Affairs which had received complaints of its potentially subversive nature.19 The group disbanded shortly after. In April 1973 Raymond Cloutier formed a new, less controversial Cooperative du Grand Cirque Ordinaire with the help of many of the original troupe's founders Paule Baillargeon, Jocelyn Berube, Suzanne Garceau, Guy Thauvette, Gilbert Sicotte, Claude Laroche, Frangois Richard, Lyse Bedard, Jean-Pierre Roy, Pierre Curzie, and Louis Baillargeon. The Cooperative performed L'Opera des Pauvres (Poor Man's Opera) at the 85


Patriote although apparently without much enthusiasm on the part of its members who had not recently worked together as a group.20 In October 1973 Suzanne Garceau, F&ule Baillargeon, and Luce Guilbeault presented Un Prince, monjour viendra (Some Prince, My Day Will Come) at the Patriote. The show was such a success both in Montreal (fifty-six performances) and at the Palais Montcalm in Quebec City in 1974 where it had a limited engagement of four performances that the Cooperative began working on a new production, this time with the help of a small grant from the Canada Council. La Tragedie americatne de Venfant prodigue (The American Tragedy of the Prodigal Son) was enthusiastically received both at the Theatre de Quat'Sous in Montreal and at the Palais Montcalm in Quebec City.21 The group's last collective creation, before its members all definitely went their separate ways early in 1976, was La Stepette impossibk (The Impossible Jig), which was produced at the Theatre de la Main and at the Cinema Outrement in Montreal in January 1976.22 This show was a commercial success rather than an event of great theatrical significance. Although essentially inoperative after this production the Cooperative only formally disbanded in 1979. It had not succeeded in inspiring young theatre groups to the extent the original Grand Cirque Ordinaire had done between 1969 and 1971. Of these, the style and goals of the Theatre Parminou, for instance, one of Quebec's most popular and successful young theatre groups, were particularly influenced by the Grand Cirque Ordinaire.23 Several young actors and former students of the Ecole Nationale de Theatre as well as the Conservatoire d'art dramatique du Quebec participated in its founding in Quebec City in 1974: Martine Beaulne, Normand Carnac-Marquis, Diane Chevalier, Helene Desperrier, Dominique Lavigne, Odette Lavoie, Michel Morency, Andre Poulin, Jack Robitaille, Jean-Leon Rondeau, Lise Roy. They performed in the Quebec City area and later in and around Victoriaville, where they moved in 1976. Their goal was the production of plays which would help denounce capitalist exploitation and develop a popular culture that would lead to changes in society's structure and value system.24 The productions, all collective creations, were developed through improvisational workshops. Sometimes the theme was predetermined by a specific request from a community or labour group. At other times, it was based on issues of basic concern to the group. These included, money matters, the work force and the class struggle. As with the GCO, their shows were characterized by the use of clowns, written signs, musical 86


accompaniment (often the accordion), sound effects, and a minimum of dialogue. In addition, and again typically, one actor usually played several roles in the course of the show, which generally had no intermission. As commercial success was not one of their aims, very little emphasis was put on publicity or on the identity of the individual actors. Nearly half of the Parminou's operating budget came from government grants although this amount varied as was the case in 1977 when the group received additional money to present one of its productions, Tbujoursplus gros (Always Bigger), in the French cities of Grenoble, Montbeliard, and Paris. In contrast, another, more militant troupe, the Theatre Euh! either refused or was denied government grants for all of its productions, even those presented outside Canada such as L'Histoire du Quebec, performed in France in 1972 and in Algeria in 1973. A young, noninstitutionalized company with explicit socialist goals,25 the Theatre Euh! was founded in 1970 by Marc Dore, Clement Cazelais, Marie-France Desrochers, Marie-Renee Charest, Yves-Erick Marier, and Lyse Bolduc. Although the company performed regularly throughout Quebec, most of its members earned their living teaching theatre courses in and around Quebec City. This allowed them the freedom to refuse government grants, to develop their own style of theatre, and to accept requests from the groups whose cause they espoused. There was no official leader of the troupe and work revenues were shared on an equal bask A good many of its performances took place in open-air public places. School gymnasiums and church basements were also popular theatre spaces, as they allowed for more intimate contact and discussions with the public. Collective creations and improvisations formed the basis of their work which also included the use of clowns, pantomime, gross exaggerations, broken action, and other techniques designed to be entertaining as well as thought-provoking. Although the majority of the young theatre groups used experimentation and improvisation as a means to an end, that is to convey their message, a few of the companies began to concern themselves more with the form than with the content of their shows. One of these originated in 1971 when Jacques Crete began working with a group of amateur actors in Montreal. At the time of their first production, Creation Collective /, in May 1973, the group were already calling themselves L'Eskabel.26 L'Eskabel was typical of many of Quebec's young theatre groups in that it was a permanent, government-subsidized company run on a cooperative basis: the members earned their principal living elsewhere, and improvisation was the main mode of production. However, L'Eskabel 87


was different from the majority of these troupes because it was one of the few young companies devoted to experimental theatre. The Eskabel sought to abolish traditional concepts of theatre and society through the creation of a scenic, sensual, dreamlike environment. Their audiences, for instance, often had to move around during a show and were not always given the opportunity to applaud at the end of a performance. Their productions emphasized mime and body movement and included the use of nudity, soft lighting, rhythmic music, slow dances, unusual make-up, and human and mechanical sounds. Crete and his group worked together as a cooperative unit and even shared living quarters. Apart from its permanent members, Jacques Crete and Therese Isabelle, each production included new company members, including amateur performers as well as young nonunionized actors. As a result, there was not always the same sense of continuity between the shows which often existed in other troupes. In 1977, for example, Crete directed the group in Arrabal's Fando et Lisas a' 'critical observer,'' and served as animateur, for a collective creation entitled Project pour tin boukversement des sens ou Vision exotique de Maria Chaplin (Project for an Upheaval of the Senses or Exotic Vision of Maria Chaplin). In 1979 Pierre Larocque wrote the script for and directed La Chambre pourpre de I'Archeveque (The Archbishop's Purple Room). In 1980 UEskabel used a text by Anne Ancrenat as a basis for Le Souffle des montagnes (The Wind From the Mountains). The Theatre Experimental de Montreal (1975-1980) also emphasized the formal aspects of theatre. As in the case of L'Eskabel, it had only a few permanent members: Robert Gravel, Anne-Marie Laprade and Yvon Leduc.27 In addition, the group acted as a central organizing committee for various independent cooperatives who wished to use the talents and resources of the T.E.M. Beautiful, striking images and dream-like sequences characterized much of the work associated with the T.E.M. and its cooperative. Paradoxically, their most successful and remarkable enterprise, La Ligue nationale d'improvisation did not correspond at all to this model. First held in 1977, the National Improvisation League, was, as the name implies, a take-off on the National Hockey League.28 There was a mock rink in the centre of the theatre, an organist to entertain the crowds and to accompany the singing of the national anthem (a nonsense version of the Maple Leaf Forever}, a "referee" to hand out penalties, players dressed in hockey sweaters, nervous coaches, rowdy crowds that interrupted the game by throwing debris on the ' Ice'' (rubber galoshes were 88


furnished at the door), and several "teams" of actors who met regularly during the "season" before they played off in the semi-finals and finals. Instead of playing hockey, the players attempted to score points for the best improvisation. A varying number of actors were given a short time to improvise on a theme picked out of a box by the referee. Improvisations were either "comparative," (each team sending out its player(s) in turn), or "mixed" (both teams "facing off" at centre ice and improvising simultaneously). The public voted by showing a card which displayed the color of their preferred team. The team that won the most votes also scored a point. Although everybody, including the referee, the players, and the organist, received an equal paycheck for the evening's "work," the winning team would receive an extra small sum of money. The LNI took place Monday evenings and Fridays at midnight and thus could count on the participation of ''off-duty'' Montreal actors and technicians. The project was so successful that in 1979, forty-eight actors and six coaches took part in the series. The audience was made up of theatre people and students. Many patrons attended the ''matches'' on a regular basis, when tickets were available, that is, for many evenings were sold out well in advance. Improvisation was no longer simply an important adjunct of contemporary Quebec theatre. Thanks to the efforts of the T.E.M. and many other young theatre groups it had become a saleable product. The history and evolution of Quebec's dynamic young theatre movement corresponds in many ways to that of the Association quebecoise du jeune theatre, which was founded in 1972 to assume the responsibilities in Quebec of the Association canadienne du theatre d'amateurs.29 ACTA had been originally conceived, in 1958, as the Quebec counterpart of the Dominion Drama Festival and as a coordinating committee for amateur francophone troupes across Canada. But it slowly changed to reflect the strong nationalist and cultural aspirations of its Quebec members. In 1968, for instance, the annual Festival included two new categories of competition: original works (option de creation] and indigenous Quebec theatre (option quebecoise). In 1970 the term ''amateur'' was replaced in official proceedings by "nonprofessional." In 1972, when ACTA became AOJT, original collective productions became its central focus. Since the majority of its young members sought to form permanent companies, the amateur groups resigned. A few years later, a conflict erupted between the militant troupes, which had no delusions of making a living from their essentially sociological endeavours and those groups that sought to become "troupes de metier," 89


(theatre "craftsmen"), devoted to theatre as a full-time occupation, however poorly paid they might be. In 1975, the Theatre Euh! and three other young theatre companies (La Gaboche, Le Tic Tac Boom, and Les Gens d'en Bas) published the ''Manifeste pour un theatre au service du peuple'' (Manifesto for a Theatre Which Serves the People).30 The four groups for whom the artistic element of theatre was less important than its ideological content and impact then withdrew from the AQJT. The Association's organizing committee, who agreed with the principal terms of the Manifesto, also resigned. With the departure of the Theatre Euh! and other militant groups, the philosophy of the theatre "craftsmen" began to dominate the Association and its more than thirty members. In 1976 the AQJT became the umbrella organization for many of Quebec's children's theatre companies, such as La Marmaille and the Theatre des Pissenlits. In 1979 it decided not only to include young professionals and children's theatre companies but also to invite amateur theatre groups to join its ranks once again. From the beginning, the AQJT's main objective was to promote regional theatre and collective indigenous creations, to sponsor workshops and colloquia, and to organize the annual Festivals and Carrefours. Most of its members operated outside professional theatre circuits, had no fixed theatre space and sought to bring theatre to completely new areas of the population. The emphasis simply changed and diversified over the years as different types of young theatre groups appeared and as it became evident that traditional criteria could no longer be used to judge or to classify theatre in modem-day Quebec.

The Focus of Drama

C

ONTRARY TO THE YOUNG theatre troupes, the majority of the dramatists of the seventies placed less emphasis on nationalist and political issues and more on the individual's role in modem society and the difficulties of interpersonal relationships: love and marriage; death and dying; the dehumanizing cities and the charm of rural life. 90


Because of Michel Tremblay's influence, however, the principal characters of the plays were frequently modelled on working-class citizens of Quebec. In addition, following his example, playwrights would write joual almost to the exclusion of standard French and would only indirectly deal with the socio-political issues of the day. Serge Sirois is a member of the Tremblay generation for whom both the past and the present bring nothing but tears for the poor. His best known play, Aujowd'hui peut-etre (Today Perhaps) which was presented at the Theatre de Quat-Sous in 1972 takes place in modem day workingclass Quebec. The main character is a fifty-nine year old alcoholic woman named Fleurette. Her loyal son Maurice has only a menial job as a kitchen helper but is determined to move his mother into a little house in the country, no matter what the cost. While waiting for the movers to come to take her away from the city, Fleurette dozes, half-drunk on beer, and dreams about her ungrateful children, who one by one, appear on stage. They include a guilt-ridden young woman, an alcoholic widow, an ambitious career woman, and a rebellious young political revolutionary. The play is reminiscent of Jacques Languirand's Les Grands Departs in that the movers never arrive. But Sirois's work is more pessimistic, since the main character, Fleurette, dies before the play ends, shortly after hearing one last piece of bad news: her favourite son, Maurice, has lost his job and his girlfriend. As he, too, waits for the movers, Maurice dresses in his mother's scarf and coat and begins to whine as she once did. Like his mother he suffers from a general malaise and is hopelessly alone with nothing to look forward to. Michel Garneau's heroes are also part of an urban setting and display many human frailities. Garneau's successful works include Strauss et Pesant (et Rosa), produced at the Theatre d'Aujourd'hui in 1974, Quatre a quatre (Four to Four) which also premiered in 1974 (at the Theatre de Quat'Sous), Les Celebrations presented at the University of Montreal's Centre d'Essai and at the Hobbit in Quebec City in 1976 and Adidou, Adidouce (How Dee Do, How Dee Do) first performed at the Theatre des Voyagements in 1977. In 1977, Garneau was offered, but refused, for political reasons, to accept the Governor General's Award for Les Celebrations and Adidou, Adidouce, Quatre a Quatre was Michel Garneau's most successful play of the seventies. Originally produced at the Theatre de Quat'-Sous in 1974, it was taken to Paris in 1975, Aubendlliers, France in 1976 and in 1977 played to enthusiastic audiences in Avignon and Paris, where it ran for over 100 performances. It was revived several times in Quebec including a 1978 91


production by the Trident. It was produced in English at Toronto's Tarragon Theatre in 1974 and at the Saidye Bronfman Centre in Montreal in 1975. Structured in somewhat the same way as Tremblay's A toit pour toujours, ta Marie-Lou, that is with four main characters conversing over several time periods, Quatre a Quatre interweaves the stories of the struggles and disappointments of four generations of Quebec women. The youngest, Anouk, has just ended an unsatisfactory love affair and is determined to become independent, foregoing all interpersonal ties, including family ones. She thinks about her mother, her late grandmother, and her great-grandmother, all of whom are on stage and who, in a series of poetic monologues and dialogues, reveal something personal to her about themselves and the hard lives they have led. Gameau's piece is more optimistic than Tremblay's for Anouk is touched by the stories she hears, accepts not rejects her past, and realizes that she can only become a strong individual if she learns to assume and to profit from her cultural heritage. The social message and implications of Quatre a Quatre is far more explicit than in any other of Garneau's works. Les Celebrations (1976) is one of Gameau's many pleasant, unpretentious plays. It is about Margo and Paul-Emile, a young unmarried urban couple who spend a great deal of time discussing their marital status. They finally agree not to get married but rather to celebrate the seven years they have spent together and the many more they hope to have with each other in the future. Gameau's literary skill is displayed in his lyrical drama Strauss etPesant (etRosa). The play opens with the death of an old woman, Rosa, who collapses suddenly the night her husband J. A. Strauss is celebrating his retirement. Strauss becomes obsessed with the fear of death and calls for Emilien Pesant, a dishonoured bishop and old family friend to hear his confession. It soon becomes evident that the two old men are lifelong antagonists. Nevertheless, after reliving their past they die in each other's arms. Rosa reappears, starts scrubbing the floor and sings of men who are pigs and of women who love them just the same. It is a poetic, intense, and grotesque ending to a play that through the constant repetition of phrases and bits of speech creates a dreamlike image of life and death. A more ironic social comedy, Adidou, Adubuce is one of the pieces Garneau wrote in collaboration with a young theatre group, Les Voyagements. The actors used multiple costume changes to portray priests, teachers, and other elite members of Quebec society who have traditional 92


and ritualistic practices in the culture, affecting everything from school ceremonies, christenings, confessions, and funerals to Bingo. In the play the presiding officers appear to be concerned less with the ceremony and its significance than with maintaining the power and prestige attached to their position. Andre Ricard's play, La Vie exemplaire d'Alcide ler, le pharamineux et de sa proche descendance (The Exemplary Life of Alcide I, the Amazing, and of his Immediate Descendants) does not deal with the working classes but it is, nevertheless, a very cynical piece. Although not a box office success when it was produced by the Trident in January 1972,31 La Vie exemplaire d'Alcide ler has made its way into the Young Theatre circuit and some critics consider it to be one of Quebec's finest literary dramas.32 In spite of the lack of commercial success of his work, two other of Ricard's plays depicting the helplessness of the rural poor were produced by the Trident: La Gbire des filks a Magloire (The Glory of McGlory's Daughters) performed in 1972 and Le Casino \bkur (Casino Thief) presented in 1975. Ricard's basic theme is that crass materialism, physical and verbal violence, crime and sexual depravity characterize the western world. In La Vie exemplaire d'Akide ler which is rich in imagery, theatrical effects, lively music and powerful dialogue, the play's hero, Alcide, has a large family whom he has taught to lie and cheat in order to get ahead. Unfortunately for him, his children have learned their lessons too well. One of his daughters, Laurence, organizes a social and political revolution. The workers under her command take over his business interests and eventually kill Alcide and all his family. No one profits from this uprising for even Laurence dies in the battle. In La Gbire desfilks a Magloire Ricard exposes the vulgarity and decadence of a country brothel during the forties, and the hypocrisy of both its French and English patrons who ostracize the young women who run the establishment. Ricard's piece, Le Casino voleur also takes place in the countryside, in an old run-down garage too far from the new highway to attract any business. Its owners, Fleurimond and Aurelienne, speak with the rural accent of the Beauce region where the play is set. They spend their time reminiscing about the old days when their political connections with the Union Nationale assured them of money and prestige. Although they dream of developing a campground on their land, when a young camper does appear, Fleurimont chases her away and puts up a ''No Vacancy'' sign. 93


He really prefers to slowly degenerate while reliving the past, however corrupt and unjust it may have been, Ricard does not judge his characters severely, but rather implies that Fleurimond, and others like him, such as the women in the brothel of Les Filles, will remain lonely, detached figures, victims of a corrupt, heartless society that uses them and then discards them when they have served their purpose. To the image of the cold, corrupt, and insensitive society that Ricard and Sirois present, Louis Saia and Louise Roy added that of a superficial, tasteless suburban world in their comedy Une Amie d'enfance (A Childhood Friend). The play was first produced at the Centre d'essai le Conventum in 1977, at the Theatre de Quat'Sous in October 1977, and was revived at the Quat'Sous in October 1979. The authors' apparent preference for the simpler rural life is confirmed in Ida Lachance which was first produced at the Centre d'essai le Conventum in February 1978. Une Amie d'enfance (1977) takes place at a suburban dinner party given by a young couple, Gaston and Angeie, for Angele's old school chum Solange and her boyfriend Coco. The evening is not very successful for various reasons not the least of which is the fact that the two couples have nothing in common. The contrast between the unconventional, and mostly happy bohemian lives of the guests and the crass materialism and monotonous lifestyle of their suburban hosts inevitably leads to conflict and their forced departure. If suburban life is worthy of ridicule, true country living is not according to Saia and Roy in Ida Lachance (1978). This work chronicles the journey of the heroine of the title as she travels across the province in search of the father of her unborn child. She eventually finds both her lover and a new identity as a strong, independent Quebecoise. Before she does so, however, Ida Lachance encounters a variety of people from Abitibi to Charlevoix and Montreal and experiences both the cold, detached citizens of the cities and their warm, human, country counterparts. The play is typical of many of those works of the seventies that describe the difficulties of life in the modern world in general and in the city in particular without ever deeply delving into the causes of this phenomenon. But it is also representative of a number of popular noncritical comedies and dramas of the time written on the trials and tribulations of the average Quebecois and which, contrary to the work of Michel lYemblay and of many young theatre groups, did not attempt, even indirectly, to convince the public to fight for social change. 94

Theatre in Modem Quebec

Roland Lepage's LeTempsd'une vie (In a Lifetime) for instance, is an intimate and nostalgic study of the life of a country girl, Rosana Guillemette. This documentary-like account of rural life in French Canada and the hardships and courage of the people at the turn of the century had over thirty performances at the Theatre d'Aujourd'hui in 1975, toured Quebec in 1976, was presented at the Festival d'Avignon in 1977 and toured France and Belgium in 1978. LeTempsd'une vie appeared in English at the Tarragon Theatre in 1978 and subsequently won the Chalmer's Award in 1978 for the outstanding Canadian play produced in Toronto that year. The play alternates between documentary and lyricism in its interpretation of Quebec's rural past. Eight distinct scenes include flashbacks and pantomime, and are structured around tense dramatic moments in Rosana's life. Eventually she is forced by circumstances and by her brother to sell the family farm; the land will be used to build a highway. Rosana finishes her days in the city, alone in her daughter's apartment, where she spends her time daydreaming about the old days in the country and looking forward to the next visit with her grandchildren. The play is staged in a romanticized rural setting which includes such charming rural props as rocking chairs and handwoven rugs. Other traditional entertainments of the era as well as the use of the rural idiom and a mixed chorus of voices singing poetic folk songs about birth, death, the harvest, the seasons, and the land all add to the nostalgic atmosphere of the play and help Lepage make the point that Rosana's poignant story is really that of a disappearing rural Quebec and its family-oriented society and of the good people who manage to survive. In 1975, the Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques toured France with yet another piece of noncritical, nostalgic Quebec drama, Serge Mercier's Encore un peu (A Little More). This work was subsequently presented in Avignon in the summer of 1976 and produced by the Nouvelle Compagnie Theatrale in January 1978. The play revolves around the three meals shared in one day by Albert and Micheline Dumouchel, a charming old couple who exchange banalities and bicker amicably as the day progresses. They live in an old house on their farm. But the land has not been worked for years and is slowly being engulfed by the fast-growing town nearby. With the children gone and old age creeping up on them, their life is dull and monotonous except for occasional contacts with the outside world. Nevertheless, they are generally content, still love each other, and have tender moments together. 95


As a strong white light diminishes the outline of their physical surroundings, symbolizing their progressive loss of life, Micheline and Albert go to bed with no regrets, happy for the good times they have had and prepared to make plans for the future days ahead. Theirs has been an idyllic life, full of love, children, farm work, and village talk. Encore un pen presents a most traditional, romantic view of rural Quebec life. A remarkable feature of these various introspective studies of Quebec's romantic cultural heritage and the individual struggles of its citizens is the virtual absence of works which deal directly with political issues such as English-French relations. Roland Lepage's La Complaints des htvers rouges (Red Winter Lament) is a notable exception as are two works by Roch Carrier, both adaptations from his novels: La Guerre, Yes Sir! and IIn'ya pas de pays sansgrand-pere (There Is No Country Without Grandfathers).33 La Complainte des Hivers rouges was produced by the Trident in 1978 and appeared at the Monument National in the spring of 1980. This fastmoving account of the sufferings of the people during the 1837 Rebellion never had the impact of Lepage's earlier play Le Temps d'une vie. La Guerre, Yes Sir! however, had more success. It was first produced by the Theatre du Nouveau Monde in November 197034 and later appeared in several Ontario centres including Stratford (Avon Theatre, 1972) and Ottawa (National Arts Centre, 1978). Carrier has rearranged the sequences of scenes in the play so that the action, is more or less chronological unlike that of the novel, which is full of flashbacks. Both the play and the novel convey the impression that the presence of l'etranger (the foreigner, the outsider) is an oppressive one. The play takes place during the Second World War in a small Ouebecois village whose French-speaking inhabitants are horrified at the idea of going to battle for the English. One man prefers to mutilate himself rather than fight a war he does not understand or support. Others, like young Corriveau who could find no way out, go overseas and perish, in his case, in a ridiculous accident. While seven English-speaking soldiers who brought his body home to rest stand guard over his coffin in the family kitchen, the neighbours come to pay their respects to the dead man they believe to be a hero and to comfort his bereaved parents, Anthyme and Mother Corriveau. The local guests, many of them amusing but degrading caricatures of French-Canadian villagers, eat, pray, drink, and tell stories. The gathering gets quite rowdy, the French and the maudits Anglais (Goddam English) 96


become more and more hostile toward each other, and the soldiers finally kick the belligerent French Canadians out. The villagers thus lose their self-respect. They are completely humiliated when one of them joins the ranks of the "foreign soldiers." On the one hand then, English are portrayed as a negative force in the life of the Quebecois, On the other hand, the unsophisticated and undisciplined Quebecois have only themselves to blame for much of their misery. Carrier's work reflects very well the self-criticism as well as the radical nationalism of the sixties. In March 1978 La Compagnie Jean Duceppe produced the stage version of II n'y a pas de pays sans grand-pere Carrier's other nationalistc play. Its hero is an old man, Vieux-Thomas, whose life was once characterized by his patience, hard work, love of nature and knowledge of the land. He now spends most of his time alone, in his handmade rocking chair, reminiscing about the past and brooding over the difficult times he and others like him have lived through. He concludes that much of these troubles have been caused by the colonialist attitude of the powerful English. No one pays much attention to the old man who finally becomes so enraged with the English that he hijacks a bus to go to Montreal and save his grandson, Jean-Thomas, another angry Quebecois who has been arrested for subversion, Vieux-Thomas is captured and put into an insane asylum where he will spend his days alone. For Carrier, radical nationalism was indeed, regretfully, a thing of the past. If Carrier's form of nationalism was not at all common in the seventies, there was one potentially political issue that was. This was the ageold male/female conflict, now seen from a feminist perspective. Although the majority of those who wrote about this question were women, several male dramatists, including Roland Lepage and Michel Garneau, wrote major works centred around female characters. Michel Tremblay was a pace setter here again for although his characters speak for all Quebecois, they are almost all female. Nevertheless, the works of Tremblay and of his male counterparts did not focus on feminist issues. Jean Barbeau was one of the few male writers who did so when he dealt specifically with the theme of women's liberation in his first full-length play, Citrouille (Pumpkin) which was produced by the Theatre du Nouveau Monde in May 1975 in Sherbrooke, at the Bois de Coulonge in July 1978, and in Paris in February 1979. In this play, three women, Rachael, Mado, and Citrouille, kidnap a local playboy, Michel LeMoyne, with the intention of persuading at least this one particular male chauvinist that women are individuals in their own 97


right and should not be treated merely as sex objects. Michel refuses to take them seriously and, in the end, only the use of violence can convince him to do so. Compared to his three captors, Michel appears as a level-headed, superior individual Rachael, Mado, and Citrouille, on the other hand, come across as frustrated, hysterical fanatics. As a result, the play was not considered a particularly positive contribution to the women's movement. Although the women's movement inspired several female dramatists to deal with feminist issues, a few women such as Francoise Loranger, whom we have already discussed, and Jacqueline Barrette chose to write on universal themes. Jacqueline Barrette used her feminine sensibilities to comment on the everyday occurrences of life, infusing her work with art and pathos. In fad&qu'essa a dire (That Says What It Says), for example, the characters lament, in free verse, that people are starving all over the world, that it's difficult for a woman to realize she's forty-seven years old, and that life is not easy, Ca dit was performed at the Patriote in March 1972. Barrette's comic revue, Gerry! Oh! Gerry! appeared at the Theatre PortRoyal at the Place des Arts in September 1972. The main character, Gerry Lafleur, is a slick pimp who runs a charm school as a means of introducing women to prostitution and acts as a therapy session leader to a group of prostitutes. Flatte ta bedaine, Ephreme (Rub Your Pot, Ephreme) was performed by the Theatre Actuel du Quebec at the Theatre Port Royal in February 1973. This revue-style piece is based on the frustration, hopelessness, and hostility felt by many Quebec men and women about life in general. In spite of such nonfeminist pieces, the women's movement began to penetrate Quebec theatre during the seventies as more and more women began writing plays that specifically addressed the social and political status of women in Quebec society. Several worked with other women on feminist collective creations. In 1974, as we have seen, Paule Baillargeon, Luce Guilbeault, and Suzanne Garceau, three members of the recently disbanded Grand Cirque Ordinaire, presented Un Prince, mon jour viendra (Some Prince, My Day Will Come) at the small Montreal club, the Patriote.35 The three women used many of the circus and Commedia dell'arte techniques developed by the GCO to produce a fast-moving show written in joual and full of music, humour, and references to Quebec culture. At the same time, UnPrinceexpressed frustration with sexual stereotypes and the general exploitation of women. It was one of the most successful of the many feminist collective creations of the time. 98


Collective creations were not confined to professional actors and writers as women from all walks of life began using theatre to advance the feminist movement. In 1975 a Montreal women's collective of housewives which called itself the Theatre des Cuisines created Moman travaille pas, a trop d'ouvrage (Mom Doesn't Work, She's Got Too Much To Do). They toured the Gaspe area with this play about the constant demands made on a wife and mother, and presented it in and around Montreal. In March 1976, the Theatre du Nouveau Monde performed La Nef des Sorcieres (Ship of Witches) for capacity audiences.36 This collective creation was based on the writings of Nicole Brossard, Marthe Blackburn, Luce Guilbeault, Odette Gagnon, Pol Pelletier, France Theoret, and MarieClaire Blais. It consisted of a series of monologues about issues of particular concern to women (prostitution, menopause, homosexuality) and others which were presented from a female perspective (adolescence, old age, artistic creation).37 La Nef des Sorcieres was followed by similar amateur and professional efforts across the province.38 In 1977, for instance, several women from Saint-Bruno grouped together under the name Theatre du Horla and produced a show of poems and monologues about the daily lives of Quebec women. La Vraie Vie des masquees (The Real Life of the Masked or Real Life Unmasked) was presented in school gymnasiums, small theatres, YWCA's, and other public places in several Quebec centres including Montreal, Granby, Drummondville, and St-Bruno. In 1978, four young actresses, Louise Laprade, Nicole Lecavalier, Pol Pelletier, and Dominique Gagnon, worked in conjunction with the Theatre Experimental de Montreal to create a sensual, violent show called A ma mere, a ma mere, a ma mere, a ma voisine (To My Mother, To My Mother, 15 My Mother, To My Neighbour). One of the most successful noncollective feminist writers was Denise Boucher. Her piece, Les Fees ont soif (The Fairies Are Thirsty) became a cause cetebre even before it was first performed by the Theatre du Nouveau Monde in November 1978.39 The Greater Montreal Arts Council refused to subsidize what it considered to be a scandalous and blasphemous work. The play was produced without the help of a MAC grant but seven Roman Catholic organizations and fifteen individuals managed to obtain a temporary injunction which delayed the publication of the script for almost two months. The protestors who rejected Boucher's criticism of the Catholic Church's traditional image of the Virgin Mary were obviously out of step with the times: more than 27,000 people flocked to see the play in 1978.40 99


LesFeesont soif which was revived by the TNM in May 1979 is a powerful one-act play with poems and music in which Boucher attacks those who perpetuate women's inferior status in society and offers a feminist re-evaluation of three stereotypes of women: the Virgin, the Whore, the Mother. Boucher makes it clear from the start that not only male chauvinism in general but the male-dominated Catholic Church in particular is responsible for much of the oppression of women through the ages. A giant rosary hangs in the backgroud, the Virgin speaks from within a life-size statue of the Virgin Mary and the three women begin their lamentations with a Gregorian chant, a graphic statement on the overpowering influence of patriarchal religion on Quebec society. The three characters that represent these archetypes are obvious references to Biblical figures: the Virgin is the Virgin Mary: the mother, Marie, brings to mind, Mary, the mother of Christ; and the whore, Madeleine, refers to Mary Magdalene. In the end, Marie leaves her husband, and the Virgin destroys her inviolate image by literally breaking out of her marble statue. Madeleine pins the two women in a general declaration of independence and a strong indictment of those who oppress and exploit women. It is an effective conclusion to a forceful and imaginative play. Elizabeth Bourget is another female writer of the seventies who dealt with both male-female relationships in modem society as well as the broader issue of women's liberation. In September 1978 Les Pichous produced her play Bernadette et Juliette ou la Vie c'est comme la vaisselle c'est toujours a recommencer (Bemadette and Juliette or Life Is Like Doing Dishes, There's Always More To Be Done), at the Centre d'essai le Conventum. This lively and humourous piece leads us through the daily routine of two couples who must cope with increasing stress created by the women's growing awareness of their right to a personal identity. As the women wash dishes they question their traditional role and their lack of power both in the work force and in society. The tension between them and their boyfriends increases as they slowly begin to redefine their role in life and determine to fight against domination and exploitation.41 Although Boucher's Les Fees ont soif definitely the most controversial and popular feminist play of the seventies, Louisette Dussault also created a stir with her piece, Moman which she performed at the Salle Fred-Barry in September 1979. In this one-woman show, Dussault plays a harrassed mother travelling from Montreal to Nicolet by bus with her two children. As the trip progresses she slowly becomes aware of the fact that she has been playing the role of an overly-protective mother that society has 100


traditionally dictated to women. Her rejection of this role and her new determination to be a free spirit can be seen at the end of the play when she stops her constant disciplining and ''mothering'' of her children and allows them to move around the bus more freely. Moman played to enthusiastic audiences at the Salle Fred-Barry, successfully toured the province of Quebec, and reappeared for several months in Montreal (at the Atelier Continu).42 The success of both Boucher's and Dussault's works clearly indicated the new willingness of Quebec theatre audiences to accept productions which addressed the status of women. The increasing number of Quebec women that had begun to write plays added a new dimension to Quebec theatre.

Jean Barbeau TEAM BARBEAU WAS ONE OF the most prolific young writers I of the seventies. Between 1970 and 1980 he produced and/or publishea more than a dozen dramatic works. Many of these were first performed in 1970. Although many of Barbeau's plays had successful productions, his early one-act works, Le Chemin de Lacroix, Manon Lastcdl, Joualez-moi d'amow, Ben-Ur, Solange, and Goglu were particularly popular in colleges, universities, and little theatres across Quebec. Solange was one of the most popular plays of this group. After its initial tour in 1970, this tender monologue played to foil houses across Quebec as well as in Avignon (summer, 1976) and, in English Canada, including a production at Toronto's Theatre du P'tit Bonheur and Edmonton's Citadel Theatre in 1978. Barbeau was one of the many writers of the seventies who used his experience gained with the collective creations of young theatre groups to develop a new form of popular theatre. He was closely involved with the creation of several collective works in 1968 and 1969 when he was a member of Laval University's Troupe des Treize,43 Et Caetera and La Frame all-dress for which Barbeau served as an unofficial animatseur were particularly well received when presented at Laval. In 1970 Barbeau helped to found the Theatre Ouotidien de Quebec with the express purpose of presenting his own one-act plays in cafeterias, 101


schools, shopping malls, and cafe-theatres in and around Quebec City, his home base. His goal was to reach audiences that rarely entered established theatres in order to "demystify" theatre and develop an indigenous Quebec culture for the ordinary citizen.44 Several of Barbeau's works reflect the influence the young theatre philosophy had on both the form and content of his writing. These include four plays which were produced by the TQQ in 1970, Ben-Ur and Le Chemin de Lacroix (The Way of Lacross), Bingo or 0-71, which the Trident performed in January 1971, La Coupe Stainless (The Stainless Cup), first produced in 1973 at the Piggery in North Hatley, and Le Grand Poucet (Tom Thumb Revisited) which appeared at the Salle Fred-Barry in October 1979. In these works, Barbeau denounced past values and injustices as well as the traditional influence of foreign culture on the Quebecois, He also defended the right of the Quebecois to their own culture and their own form of nationalism. Barbeau's experience with the Troupe des Treize is also evident in Bingo or 0-71 (1971). This play was typical of collective creations in Quebec in its use of music and song, and the disregard of a story-line in favour of a series of loosely connected scenes. Barbeau uses the recent history of bingo as the frame for a lively fresco of Quebec's rapid postwar evolution. The play depicts the role that bingo has played in the village of SaintChristophe over the years. In 1949, it was considered "illegal," in 1955, the religious and social elite "tolerated" the game and by 1971, it had become an ''officially approved'' commercial enterprise run by the Church. The subject of Bingo is not as overtly socialistic or nationalistic as in other works more closely linked to the collective creation format. Ben-Ur (1970) makes a much more powerful statement about the social and cultural realities of Quebec. Barbeau acknowledged his source of inspiration for this piece was the Grand Cirque Ordinaire's production of T'es pas tannee, Jeanne d'Arc?*5 Following the example of the GCO, Barbeau used cabaret routines, popular songs, caricatures, and placards to criticize Quebec's religious naivety and the influence of foreign languages and heroes on its culture. Ben-Ur's only escape from the banality of his life are the adventure fantasies he creates and plays out based on the lives of American comicbook heroes like Tarzan and Tonto and on the various ' 'courageous'' men who have lived in or come to Quebec. He eventually dismisses the foreigners as greedy colonizers and rejects the traditional historical figures on the grounds that they are not popular heroes. Unfortunately, hockey stars and popular singers do not measure 102


up to his standards either. When this search for an authentic Quebec hero fails he abandons his comic books, and turns to sleeping on the sofa in a re-enactment not of stirring adventure but of his own father's empty life. It is a bitter ending to a thought-provoking social satire. Barbeau severely condemned the exploitation of the "little man" by the established "system" in Le Chemin de Lacroix (1970). In this case, the victim is Rodolphe Lacroix, who was picked up by the police simply because he looted lite a typical young tough who participated in the protest marches they hate. Le Chemin de Lacroix is set in Quebec City during the period the Union Nationale introduced the controversial language bill, Bill 63, in the Quebec Assembly. The bill provoked riots and confrontations between police and protestors, who were mainly students and young workers. Lacroix's arrest thus had political connotations that included the fight the people were leading against the government and the unfair advantage the latter had through its indiscriminate use of the police force. Le Chemin de Lacroix was first produced during Holy Week of 1970, and the juxtaposition of the secular and the religious in Catholic-educated Quebec resulted in an even more effective political statement. As Lacroix and his two friends, Thierry (a French man) and Monique, act out the drama of his personal Calvary, the parallel between Christ's crucifixion and Lacroix's humiliations becomes increasingly ironic. For example, at one station Lacroix meets his mother. She, however, is a prostitute who has been picked up for streetwalking. She avoids imprisonment by being friendly with "the boys" and feels no real sorrow for her son whom she doesn't even attempt to help. Throughout the play the audience is kept amused by Thierry's continued attempts at improving Lacroix's speech. Lacroix then chastises the audience for laughing at his language and for their apparent indifference to the police brutality which culminates in his admission to a hospital. Lacroix's last futile curse, ''Tabarnac,'' is the frustrated cry of a man whose only avenue of revolt is the continued use of his own brutal language, joual In La Coupe Stainless (1973) Barbeau offered another satirical view of Quebec. This time a broomball parody of the National Hockey League and its Stanley Cup finals allowed him to mate several points about Quebec politics. The main character, Ti-Bum, is a star broomball player, who must decide whether or not to renew his contract with the league, a decision analagous to the one the Quebecois must mate regarding a continued association with English Canada. In this light, Ti-Bum's "wise" decision 103


not to accept the terms of the contract can be seen as an affirmation of the separatist option. At the same time, running gags, religious parody, comic routines, and the use tipual all enhance Quebec's folk and popular cultures which nurture the nationalist political goals Ti-Bum has set for himself and his fellow teammates. The use of the trappings of music and laughter as an ironic setting for the misery of his characters was used by Barbeau in Le Grand Poucet (1979). This lively revue uses the collective format to focus on Quebec's socially and culturally oppressed workers, as represented by the daily struggles of the people of the Abitibi region. The title makes ironic reference to the traditional fairy tale Le Petit Poucet (Tom Thumb) and serves to point out the need for a new and realistic perspective of Quebec's collective experience. Jean Barbeau's concern for Quebec's working class, his defense of the French language as it is spoken in Quebec, his denunciation of Quebec's religious and political past, and of foreign cultural influences, and his search for an authentic popular culture are all typical of the work produced by the young theatre movement. But Barbeau has also dealt with themes and techniques similar to those of Michel Tremblay and the many noncollective writers of the seventies. Like Tremblay, for instance, Barbeau used joual extensively as a symbol of individual and national valour and honesty. In his hilarious comedies, Manon Lastcall (TQQ, 1970) and Joualex-moi /'amour (Speak to Me of Love, in joual, a take-off off the popular love song, "Parlez-moi d'amour,'' TQQ, 1970) he goes one step further by explicitly underlining the vital and dynamic nature of joual. The conclusion one is led to draw is that the popular language of the Ouebecois must penetrate all strata of society in order for its culture to survive. In Manon Lastcatt (1970), the working-class heroine triumphs over all thanks to her natural vitality and her confident acceptance of herself, her language, and her cultural identity. Manon Deslauriers manages to get a job as a guide in the Quebec provincial museum from the curator Maurice, a stuffy bourgeois who speaks impeccable French. Her hilarious comments on the museum's works of art and her unaffected behaviour (she announces closing time as if she were a bar-maid, with a hearty ''Last call'') soon draws large crowds to the museum. Her notoriety even brings a visit and eventual outrage from the Minister of Cultural Affairs. By the time he arrives, accompanied by the curator's self-righteous and snobbish wife, Maurice has come around to Manon's way of thinking about life and has reverted to the Quebecois vernacular, for Barbeau's 104


moral is that culture is founded on verbal communication and honest expression. Joualez-moi d'Amour (1970) resembles Manon Lastcall in that it is a comedy with a message about language. Jules pays a visit to a prostitute, Julie, who happens to be from France. When he realizes he can't relate to her or successfully act out childhood scenes, because she speaks a working-class French from France, Jules teaches Julie his mother's accent and vocabulary. He is unhappy with the results until he himself starts using joual. Thanks to his rediscovery of his "mother" tongue, Jules is not only able to successfully act out his fantasies, he even becomes quite virile. Joual thus becomes a symbol which allows men to be men and Quebecois to be themselves. It is interesting to note here that Michel Tremblay's Duchesse de Langeais uses French from France to put on airs but speaks in joual to express her real feelings. For both Tremblay and Barbeau, joual is vital to personal (and collective) happiness. Finally, several of Barbeau's plays are typical of the seventies in that they focus on the hardships of the modern world, the plight of the individual, and the difficulties of interpersonal relationships. Solange and Goglu (both produced by the Theatre Quotidien de Quebec in 1970), Une Brosse, (A Binge, The Trident, April 1975), Citrouille (Pumpkin, Theatre du Nouveau Monde, 1975) and Entile et une nuit (Emile and One Night, a play on the title, A Thousand and One Nights, Theatre du Rideau Vert, October 1979) all present characters who have serious personal problems. Barbeau does not always explain the cause of their unhappiness but he does effectively demonstrate their solitude and their general anxiety and like Tremblay, insists on the importance of tenacity and selfacceptance. Solange (1970) is a poetic and moving monologue in which the woman of the title tells the audience about her life as a nun and the reason for her dismissal: she had sexual relations with another nun. She also tells of the young and handsome revolutionary she met on a train one day and with whom she had a brief affair. Three years later, Solange is still dreaming about him and has a keepsake that reminds her of him, a picture of Jesus Christ. As with Tremblay's Manon in Damnee Manon, Sacree Sandra, her naive confusion of love, sex, and religion is a bitter reflection on the ignorance and superstitions that existed in Catholic Quebec. The devotion of Barbeau's heroine to a mysterious revolutionary figure also indicates the need for love and affection as well as for someone to believe in, a heroic figure to look up to and to make life worth living. 105


Citrouille (1975) represents Barbeau's attempt to deal with the question of women's liberation. As we have seen, the women in this two-act play turn out to be merely a foil for the man who comes across as much more level-headed and worthy of respect than his captors. Nevertheless, Citrouille does provide food for thought about traditional male-female relationships and female stereotypes. In Goglu (1970) two young taxi drivers, the hero of the title and his friend Godbout, try to forget how lonely they both are. Goglu, who does most of the talking, is especially conscious that he is ugly and fears he will never find anyone to love him. They both while away the time sitting on a park bench, fantasizing about women, and gazing into the St-Lawrence River. Une Brosse (1975) centres on the frustrations of two other young men, Marcel Brisson and Gaston Lemieux. This time, the two neighbours both unemployed, sit on a doorstep getting very drunk, waiting for news of a job they are hoping to get and talking about the rotten state of the world. They also discuss points of vocabulary and grammar. When a policeman tries to arrest them for disorderly conduct and starts taking down their statements, Gaston becomes infuriated at the man's attempt to appropriate his words. There follows a series of wild, symbolic murders of people who, for Gaston and Marcel, are no better than garbage. They include the policeman, a prostitute, and a few politicians. As none of these crimes ever really takes place one can only assume that Marcel and Gaston will continue to outwardly defend the established principles of law and order after having purged a secret desire for anarchy. In Emite et une nuit (1979), Etienne, a disillusioned twenty-year-old, decides to commit suicide rather than continue to seek some unattainable ideal. He intends to end his life in a metro station, but Emile, an old derelict and philosopher, who lives underground, persuades him to go on living with the assurance that even when you have nothing and no one, you still have your life and your hope. Barbeau was typical of the Tremblay generation in his use of the popular idiom and his concern with the personal dilemmas of the working classes of Quebec. His work also reflected that of the young, sometimes militant theatre troupes of the seventies which made extensive use of cabaret style and Brechtien techniques to transmit their definitely critical views of Quebec's sociopolitical past and present.

106


Jean-Claude Germain

W; r

HEN JEAN-CLAUDE GERMAIN was awarded the Prix Victor-Morin in 1977, the Societe Saint-JeanBaptiste officially recognized the importance of his lively and provocative work in theatre.46 As we have seen, Germain first became involved with theatre in Quebec in the late sixties when he worked as an animateur with some young actors grouped together under the name the Theatre du Meme Norn or Les Enfants de Chenier. Throughout 1972, Germain collaborated with another group of young actors, les P'tits Enfants Laliberte (Liberty's Little Children, or Grand Children) with whom he coproduced four works. It is interesting to note that both the troupes Germain worked with used the term, "En/ants" to describe themselves, coupled with a political reference: "La Liberte" or "Chenier." The latter indicates the importance of Germain and his colleagues of the historical past and the nationalist aspirations of the Quebecois as Chenier was leader of the 1837 Patriotes and Les Fils de la Liberte was the named used by the 1838 Patriotes. Enfants implied that as descendants of heroic figures, Quebecois have a responsibility to grow and develop in a manner worthy of their ancestors' sacrifice. For Germain, the nationalistic aspirations of the Quebecois were inextricably linked to the past. Much of his own dramaturgy centred around his efforts to destroy the myths that coloured the average Quebecois' view of his social, political and cultural history, and to replace them by a series of new images that allowed his audience to re-evaluate the present and plan for the future. In spite of the serious message which Germain's work was frequently intended to convey, his plays were generally considered good, light entertainment. L'Affront Commun (The Common Affront), Mamours et Conjugat, scenes de la vie amoureuse quebecoise (Mamours and Conjugat, Scenes of Quebec's Love Life), Un Pays dont la devise est je m'oublie (A Country Whose Motto Is I Forget), L'Ecole des reves (The School of Dreams), A Canadian Play/Une plaie canadienne (A Canadian Play/A Canadian Wound), Les Nuits de l'Indiva (The Nights of the Un-diva), his adaptation of Les Faux Brillants (The Counterfeits) and his best known work Les Hauts et las bans dans la vie d'une diva, Sarah Menard par eux-memes (The Ups and Downs in the Life of a Diva, Sara Menard, 107


by Themselves) all use laughter and sometimes music as valuable political weapons. In L'Affront Conmun for instance, produced at the Centre du Theatre d'Aujourd'hui (CTA) in November 1973, Germain took an amusing but critical look at the 1982 general strike in Quebec by Le Front Commun, This play ridicules both the union leaders and the politicians they had to deal with. Germain's satiric comments on the latter are particularly strong and include references to the Parliament which had to close for lack of activity and the indifferent leaders who wielded their power unwisely and irrationally. His sardonic treatment of historical figures continued in A Canadian Play/Une plaie canadienne, a clever piece about Canadian political leaders. It was produced in April 1979 at the CTA. In it, Germain relates the actions and attitudes of three French-Canadian prime ministers of Canada to those of Lord Durham who in 1839 recommended Canadian unity and the assimilation of the French Canadians into an English society. In A Canadian Play, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Louis-Stephen Saint-Laurent and Pierre Elliot Trudeau, all of whom had an anglophone mother, are portrayed as the heirs of Durham's ideology which is considered by some to be the root cause of many of Quebec's sociopolitical problems. In a less political vein, Mamours et Conjugat, scenes de la vie amoureuse quebecoise, produced at the CTA in November 1978, used the problems which the men and women of Quebec have had in relating to each other as a means of exploring the external causes of Quebec's existence. In New France, it was the harsh climate and the formidable physical conditions. In 1840, a few years after the Rebellion, the English were to blame. In the early twentieth century, the Church interfered with marital relations. Towards 1950, alcoholism had become a serious problem, and during the Quiet Revolution alcohol and drugs were the cause for general confusion and marital tensions. Each one of these interlopers intrudes upon the marital relationship; a personification of each of the external forces actually tries to get into bed with the couples. As the former are graciously accommodated, Germain lays the blame for the couple's inability to become a closer knit unit on their own weakness in not resisting the forces from without who seek to displace them. Germain also implies that a rethinking of the past is necessary to place the participants in Quebec's history in their proper perspective. It is a point of view which appears in many of his plays. Germain added his own perspective to Felix-Gabriel Marchand's Les Faux Brillants when he adapted it for a production at the CTA in March 108


and November 1977. In the 1885 original, Marchand used the traditional scenario of young lovers, mistaken identities, and joyful reunions to create a classic comic piece where the hypocritical villain, in this case a false Italian baron, is finally unmasked and order is restored in an otherwise happy bourgeois household. In Germain's version of the play, the master of the house the villain of the piece, is a ridiculous figure who tries to deny his culture. His servants are shown to be good, simple people with a lot of common sense. Although Germain adopted Marchand's general plot he modified all the characters to conform to his message that all Quebecois are members of the same village, the same community and that their common heritage was more important than any of their social aspirations. In Un Pays dont la devise est je m'oublie (A Country Whose Motto Is I Forget), produced at the CTA in March 1976 and revived in November 1976, Germain again reminded his fellow Quebecois of their common heritage. The play champions the natural goodness and wisdom of the common people and ridicules Quebec's historical' 'heroes.'' In this work two wandering actors (Canadiens errants?), Episode Surprenant and Berthelot Petitboire, portray a series of figures who have played a role in Quebec's history: the coureur de bois, the Habitant, the cure, the explorer, and the politician. The sketches are broad caricatures and riotously funny, invariably critical of the official account of the exploits of Quebec's traditional heroes. The two "authentic" heroes of the play, Quebec strongman Louis Cyr and hockey player Maurice Richard, are treated much more sympathetically. In the final scene, Cyr reminds Richard, who feels inferior because of his lack of education, that what counts in life is to do one's personal best so as to help the "team" achieve victory. The team, in this case, is a metaphorical image of the cultural solidarity of the Quebecois. Germain's rejection of a class system is further enforced by the language used by Surprenant and Petitboire for it is the same for all the characters they portray, whatever the social class. Furthermore, these Quebecois, as most of Germain's characters, do not speak joual with its many anglicisms. Their colourful speech is full of archaisms and colloquial expressions. Their accent and intonation are also distinctly Quebecois. Episode Surprenant and Berthelot Petitboire reappeared in L'Ecok des reves (The School of Dreams) which premiered at the CTA in April 1978. This time, the actors relive the different roles they have played in their lifetime, acting them out in costumes they pull from an old sea trunk. The characters they recreate include classic personages like Louis XIII and Cyrano de Bergerac. The latter are made to look even more ridiculous 109


than the other figures because they are part of the ' 'foreign'' culture that Germain vigorously and consistently denounced. Germain's best known work is both entertaining and instructive and clearly demonstrates his disdain for official myths and French culture and his belief that an honest look at Quebec's past can contribute to a better life for today's Quebecois. Les Hants et les bas dans la vie d'une diva, Sarah Menard par ewc-memes (The Ups and Downs in the life of a Diva, Sarah Menard, by Themselves) was first produced at the CTA in November 1974. It was revived in January 1975 and again in October 1975, toured English Canada in 1976, and was presented at the Theatre in the Americas Festival held in Washington D.C. in June 1979. The heroine of Les Hauts et les bas, Sarah Menard, represents Germain's model Quebecois in that she is a strong individual who has learned from the past and who looks to the future with optimism and enthusiasm. Like any other star, Sarah Menard enjoys being recognized and in fact thrives on it. But as the play unfolds and she talks and, with the help of her piano accompanist, sings about her past, the men she has met and the roles she has played, we learn of the struggles she has had and the insults (les "bas") she has endured. All this makes success that much more important to this woman, who started out as an insecure convent girl singing at Church benefits in her home own Saint-Marthe-sur-Mer. Sarah has since performed throughout the world, from New York to Italy, and takes great pleasure in reliving the highlights (les "hauts") of her career. The multiple costume changes, the numerous music-hall numbers and the satiric opera renditions (the dying heroine manages to sing an aria in full voice) which this re-enactment entails provide lively entertainment. As usual with Germain, there are many ironic aspects to the play. Perhaps the most noteworthy is the parody of opera and classical theatre Germain creates around the figure of Sarah Menard. Her name, for instance, brings to mind that of the great nineteenth-century French actress Sarah Bernhardt, once greatly revered both in France and in Quebec. Sarah Menard, of course, is not a sophisticated Parisian but a self-taught, small-town Quebecoise version of a star. Moreover, she has no great respect for her art. In fact, we eventually learn she hates opera. The ultimate irony is that although she had planned to triumphantly return to her hometown to open the local cultural centre which will be given her name, the centre actually houses a swimming pool and is more of an athletic than a cultural centre. This information comes as a surprise and a disappointment to her. By the end of the play, however, after 110


having reviewed her career, she decides to accept the compliment for what is it worth, for she has come to realize the positive influence her village and its inhabitants have had on her life and her sense of who she is. Sarah Menard accepts and understands her past and uses it to create her own identity. In the sequel to this play, Les Nuits de I'lndiva (The Nights of the Undiva) presented at the CTA, in 1980, Sarah Menard has rejected the opera she despises for the night-club world she adores. Sarah now works in a cabaret where she enjoys dressing in various exotic costumes from that of a belly dancer to a geisha. Throughout the play she is portrayed as a person who faces the present with gusto and a healthy scepticism that allows her to see both the serious and the humorous side of life and Quebec society. Nevertheless, the determined Sarah maintains her firm resolve to retain her independence, even to the extent of refusing to participate in the opening of the new Montreal Opera House. Over the years, Germain consistently treated the past not with romantic nostalgia but with affectionate irony. At the same time, he showed how certain positive aspects of Quebec's heritage could throw new light on contemporary issues. His particularly irreverent treatment of Quebec's historical figures helped rid Quebec's theatre world of its obsession with imported works and attitudes. In addition to his re-evaluation of Quebec's myths and traditions, Germain's social criticism and his honour all contributed to the development of a distinctly national theatre.

Ill


Conclusion


A

aLTHOUGH THE NATURE of theatre in Quebec changed A,over the years, several major points of reference emerge from our historical overview. The first is that for well over three hundred years, Quebec theatre was dominated by Church and State, the latter more recently replacing the former in both its supportive and its censoring functions. During the first half of the seventeenth century, Catholic seminaries sponsored student productions which were well attended by both the clergy and government officials. However, the Church was hostile to secular theatrical endeavours and, throughout the eighteenth century, consistently censured French-language productions. Government representatives generally supported Church policies in this respect although they seldom interfered directly. When French-language theatre became more dynamic, towards the end of the nineteenth century, the Church once again attempted to discourage its members from attending plays but the population was no longer so easily controllable. Between 1900 and 1950 the theatre scene changed rapidly in Quebec and the Church, which was slowly losing its almost monopolistic position of authority, could do little to hinder its progress. As the Church's role decreased during the twentieth century that of the State increased steadily, particularly after the 1950s. If the influence of the former was, in general, a negative one, that of the latter was mostly positive. Nevertheless, as we have seen, with government involvement came a certain amount of control and indirect censorship. On the whole, the State has actively and consistently supported theatre writers and craftsmen and thus permitted many of them to contribute in a regular way to the growth of this aspect of Quebec culture. As religious and government authorities played an important part in the development of theatre in Quebec, so religion and politics became dominant themes in many of the plays produced in this province. Most of the school productions of the 1700s were religious plays. Historical dramas were the most popular form of theatre in the following century, 115


while from World War I to the late 1930s the stage was dominated by patriotic and moralistic pieces. Until the middle of the twentieth century, the treatment of religion and politics was generally conservative with little critical content. During the 1960s, the Quiet Revolution promoted a re-evaluation of Catholicism and the role of traditional Christian values in society. Many indigenous works of this period reflect a new, critical awareness of the influence of Catholicism in Quebec. The works of Marcel Dube, Francoise Loranger, and Michel Tremblay, to name a few, all contain negative references to the role the Church has played in Quebec's history and culture; the blind defense of law and order, ignorance and superstition, crass materialism, hypocrisy, and a general narrow-mindedness have all been attributed to the way religion and morality were taught in Catholic Quebec. During this same period, the atmosphere of political change was evident in the success of plays which dealt with the political alienation and collective struggles of the Quebecois. Federal/provincial relations, French/English conflicts, bilingualism, separatism, and Quebec's rising nationalism were all issues dealt with by such writers as Gratien Gelinas, Jacques Ferron, Robert Gurik, and Francoise Loranger. Religion and politics, Church and State became unifying symbols of the distinct national flavour of Quebec theatre. Another common characteristic is the constant struggle between the traditional past and the modem present. The rapid modernization of Quebec meant that dramatists from Jacques Languirand to Jean-Claude Germain often created characters who were torn between their desire for personal and collective prosperity and their attachment to more traditional values and modes of behaviour. The family came to represent many of the values associated with the past and a rural way of life. Many writers situated their characters in a rather traditional family setting and then proceeded to criticize the merits of this particular social institution in the context of a modern, urban Quebec. The works of Michel Tremblay, for example, stressed the stifling nature of close-knit families and the traditional moral values they foster. At the same time, his plays clearly defended the right of the Quebecois to partake of the material advantages of modernization and urbanization. In many instances, the search of the characters for some form of freedom was an additional factor complicating their ideological struggle between the past and the present. Often, the purging of certain social and moral traditions, particularly of oppressive family ties, was depicted as a necessary step to the achievement of true personal or collective independence. 116

Conclusion

This brings us to our third and final distinguishing characteristic of Quebec dramaturgy: the far-reaching sociological and political relevance of most of the plays discussed. It is often the case that very little distinction was made between the hopes and dreams of the individual characters and those of the community as a whole. Indeed, most Quebec dramatists tended to use the personal troubles of their personages to portray the collective frustrations and aspirations of all Quebecois, For Marcel Dube, Michel Tremblay, Michel Garneau, Jean-Claude Germain, and many others, the lessons learned by one individual represented possible solutions for the survival and happiness of the entire community. Even the feminist plays of the seventies were not purely individualistic or anecdotal for they sought to demonstrate how Quebec women in general were exploited and how they desperately needed to break out of their traditional stereotypical molds. The use of joual also had definite political overtones. As we have seen, such dramatists as Michel Tremblay, Serge Sirois, and Jean Barbeau effectively used this form of French to indicate that in their view francophone Quebec was a nation of second-class citizens who were not in a position to control their own destinies but who, nevertheless, had their own worthwhile way of life. Whether or not any of the plays which dealt with questions of religion and politics, the family, and urban life had any real impact on the structure of Quebec society is open to debate. It is clear, however, that Quebec dramaturgy was never one in which its writers were content merely to entertain. As the Quebecois strived to preserve a unique cultural identity, their playwrights sought to influence the cultural social and political debates of the day. In so doing, they helped shape Quebec's future.

117


Notes

INTRODUCTION

Among the many responses to this controversial action was a midnight show of satirical sketches organized by the Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, on December 8, 1972, at the Gesu, titled La Nuit de l'Immaculee Creation, Jeune Theatre, no. 1 (janvier-fevrier 1973): 3-10. Some of this research was also used as the basis for articles on Quebec Theatre which have appeared in several scholary journals. (See Bibliography.)

PART I

Baudouin Burger, "Les Spectacles dramatiques en NouveEe-France (1606-1760)," in Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds., Paul Wyczynski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), pp. 33-57. Benjamin Suite, "L'Ancien Theatre canadien," in L'Annuaire theatral 1908-1909, ed. Georges Robert (1908), pp. 52-60. Quebec's bishop, Monseigneur de Saint-Vallier, for instance, did not hesitate to express his concern for the morals of the young people (including the Governor's daughter) who appeared in public places to recite verse or portray characters. Jean Beraud, Leon Franque, and Marcel Valois, Variations sur trois themes (Montreal: Les Editions Fernand Pilon, 1946), p. 30. N.K. Clifford, "Religion and the Development of Canadian Society: An Historical Analysis," in Church History 38, no. 4 (1969): 506. The Moliere/Tartuffe Affair of 1694 in which Governor Frontenac and Monseigneur de Saint-Vallier came into bitter conflict is a clear example of the fact that Church and State were not separate in New France. Moreover, most historians agree that the power and influence of the Church in New France was great. Mason Wade, for instance, points out that "sous 1'autorite des Jesuites et de Mgr. de Laval, le pouvoir civil vint bien pres d'etre soumis au pouvoir spirituel dans les affaires temporelles ou l'autorite du Pape fut regardee comme supreme et non sujette aux coutumes d'une Eglise nationale." Mason Wade, Les Canadiens francais de 1760 a nos jours, vol. I (Montreal: Cercle du Livre de France, 1966), p. 18. 119


5. Mason Wade states clearly that the Bishop, the Governor, and the Intendant were "les trois chefs de radministration coloniale sous le regime francais," (ibid., p. 18) Among the numerous specific examples of this close relationship is the historical testimony provided by Marcel Rioux of the administrative role played by the parish priest of Lauzon: "il recevait les testaments, redigeait les donations et se chargeait des ecritures qu'on voulait lui confier." Edmond Roy, Historie de la Seigneurie de Lauzon, vol. II (Levis: 1898), p. 63, in Marcel Rioux, La Question du Quebec (Paris: Editions Seghers, 1971), p. 30. 6. Leopold Houle, "Les Mandements de Mgr. de St-Vallier," in L'Histoire du theatre au Canada (Montreal: Fides, 1945), pp. 26-9; Jean Laflamme and Remi Tourangeau, "L'Affaire du Tartuffe," in L'Eglise et le theatre au Quebec (Montreal: Fides, 1979), pp. 58-66; Seraphim Marion, "Le Tartuffe et Mgr. de SaintVallier," in Lettres canadiennes d'autrefois (Hull: Editions L'Eclair), pp. 15-31; Robert-Lionel Sequin, "Les Divertissements," in La Vie libertine en Nouvelle France au 17 siecle (Montreal: Lemeac, 1972), pp. 217-24. 7. Although there were some performances put on in schools and colleges, these were for internal use and can in no way be considered to have been "public" performances. This is generally held to be true among theatre historians. To cite two of them: "Apres l'affaire Tartuffe en 1694, le theatre disparut de la Conquete au XXe siecle," John Hare, "Panorama des spectacles au Quebec de la Conquete au XXe siecle," in Archives deslettrescanadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds., Paul Wyczynski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), p. 60. "Le clerge avait reussi a s'oposer efficacement a l'activite theatrale puisque celleci est absente ou presque de la capitale pendant tout le XVIIIe siecle francais," Baudoin Burger, LActivitetheatraleau Quebec: 1765-1825 (Parti Pris, 1974), p. 46. "Le clerge ... a reussi a bloquer tout essai de representations dramatiques suivies," (Burger, p. 47). See also Laflamme and Tourangeau, "Paralyse des activites theatrales," L'Eglise et le theatre au Quebec, pp. 71-3. 8. Leopold Houle, L'Histoire du Theatre au Canada, Pour un retour aux classiques (Montreal: Fides), p. 43. See also John Hare's remarks on the ambiguity of these records in "Panorama des spectacles au Quebec de la Conquete au XXe siecle," p. 62. 9. Baudoin Burger, L'Activite theatrale au Quebec, p. 64-65. 10. E.Z. Massicotte, Recherches historiques sur les spectacles a Montreal de 1769 a 1800 (Ottawa: Societe Royale du Canada, 1932), p. 114. 11. Massicotte, Recherches historiques, p. 120. 12. The operatic version was first revived in Toronto in 1963 thanks to Godfrey Ridout's restoration of the music and was presented on radio in 1965. 13. Although we are sure Colas et Colinette was presented on stage in 1790 and although we know Quesnel was a popular and well-known figure of his day, no one can say for certain whether this was in part due to the public being aware of his plays through the reading of them or through their public performance. In his detailed article entitled, "Le theatre de Joseph Quesnel," David Hayne makes no categorical statement on this issue but rather concludes: "Autant de questions qui, en 1'etat actuel de nos connaissances, doivent rester sans reponse," David M. Hayne, "Le Theatre de Joseph Quesnel," in Archives deslettrescanadiennes,

120

14.

15. 16. 17.

Notes vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds. Paul Wyczynski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), pp. 109-36. Equally adamant, however, is Jean DuBerger in the Dictionnaire des Oeuvres titteraires du Quebec, vol. I (Fides, 1978) when he writes that L'Anglomanie was indeed performed in 1802: "cette piece comedie [sic] en un acte et en vers fut composee et creee en 1802" (p. 31). My statement regarding L'Anglomanie is deliberately ambiguous so as to apply to either the written text or, in the event, the performed one. Theatre historians generally agree that the French language theatre of the time was at best sporadic and at worse nonexistent: "Sous le regime francais, les conditions d'existence de I'activite theatrale ont ete insuffisantes pour developper une tradition de representations" (Burger, p. 55). "Apres 1'affaire Tartuffe en 1694, le theatre disparut de la colonie. La Conquete de 1760 ne changea que tres peu cette situation. Se relevant d'une delate couteuse, la population francophone ne pouvait guere consacrer ses loisirs au theatre." (Hare, 1976, p. 60). Hare points out that according to Murray Edwards's study of the period, even English theatre was "informal" (p. 60). In any case, for Hare, French language theatre dates from the late 1700s. "Le theatre . . . commence timidemnent a la fin du XVIIIe siecle" (p. 78). Achives Nationales du Quebec (Quebec City), Le Bulletin des recherches historiques (Levis) 42, no. 11 (November 1936): 642-66; no. 12 (December 1936): 184-8. Archives Nationales du Quebec (Quebec City), Le Bulletin des recherches historiques (Levis) 42, no. 2 (February 1937): 33-45; no. 3 (March 1937): 65-70; no. 4 (April 1937): 97-101. Few French touring companies came to perform in Canada in the early 1800s. In fact, French-speaking Canadians, as a whole had no sustained or official contact with their former countrymen after 1763 until, the coming of the Capricieuse in 1855, the first French merchant vessel to be allowed by the British to visit Canada. Those European companies that did perform were mainly English, at that time stopping off in Canada on the way to or from the United States. On the other hand, the College de Nicolet, and the College Ste-Marie, are but two examples of the many colleges which sponsored student productions in Quebec. College Ste-Marie was particularly active in this respect while it was at the College de Nicolet that Canada's first indigenous historical play was performed (p. 12). Most colleges staged plays at least once a year in Quebec. In eastern Quebec, for instance, according to Alonzo LeBlanc, in many cases three or four of these "soiree dramatique" took place a year: "Une etude plus systematique de ces programmes revelerait des constantes qui furent sans doute les memes dans la plupart des colleges, a Ste-Anne de la Pocatiere, a Rimouski, a Gaspe, a Chicoutimi, aussi bin qu'a Quebec ou a Levis et dans les autres colleges de la province. Il y avait trois ou quatre pieces principales par annee: par exemple, a la Ste-Catherine, a la Ste-Thomas et a la fin de l'annee." Alonzo Leblanc, "La Tradition theatrale a Quebec (1790-1973)," in Archives deslettrescanadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds. Paul Wyczynski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), p. 213.

121


18.

19. 20. 21.

22. 23.

Jean Laflamme et Remi Tourangeau point out that across the province and throughout the nineteenth century colleges became increasingly involved with theatre. They also point to the College Ste-Marie and the College de Nicolet as two of the most active in this respect: "En 1867, le Seminaire de Quebec ainsi que les Colleges de Joliette et de Rigaud relancaient la coutume des seances dramatiques annuelles. Ces institutions etaient heureuses de rattraper le Seminaire de Trois-Rivieres et les (Colleges de Sainte-Marie, de l'Assomption et de Nicolet qui n'avaient jamais tout a fait abandonne la tradition theatrale. En 1870 et 1871, les Colleges de Saint-Laurent et de Montreal emboitent le pas." L'Eglise et le theatre au Quebec (Montreal: Fides, 1979), p. 163. Franklin Graham, Histrionic Montreal (Montreal: John Lovell and Son, 1902), pp. 97-115. See also Raymond Montpetit, "La Construction des theatres a Montreal au dix-neuvieme siecle critique de l'historiographie," Aspects du Theatre quebecois, ed. Etienne Duval (Trois-Rivieres, Universite du Quebec a TroisRivieres, 1978), pp. 41-55. The first attempt at establishing a permanent company was unsuccessful. In 1804, a Mr. Ormsby announced to the ladies and gentlemen of Montreal that he intended to establish a theatre in their city. He did not stay long as he was obliged to leave only a few months after he arrived from Albany, New York, mainly because of his leading lady who scandalized the public by performing in an inebriated state. His company was not missed for long, however, since there were soon many other actors who came to perform in Montreal. E.Z. Massicotte, "Les Theatres et les lieux d'amusements a Montreal pendant le dixneuvieme siecle," in L'Annuaire theatral 1908-1909, p. 83. A few were serious, such as the Theatre St-Louis fire in 1846, in which fifty people died. Graham, Histrionic Montreal, p. 102. Such as the magician, Adrien in 1835, Jean Beraud, 350 ans du theatre au Canada francais (Montreal: Cercle du livre de France, 1958), p. 29. See also E.Z. Massicotte, "Les Theatres et les lieux," p. 85. While the actors were warmly welcomed, the stars were especially well taken care of. Edmund Kean, for instance, was received royally by the local dignitaries, including the governor, and was made an honorary chief of the Huron Indians when he visited Canada in 1826. Massicotte, "Les Theatres et les lieux," pp. 82-96. Hare, "Panorama des spectacles au Quebec: de la Conquete au XXe siecle," pp. 93 and 86. Georgette Weiller, Sarah Bernhardt et le Canada (Quebec: Editions Athena, 1973).

24. Ibid., p. 129.

25. John Hare and Ramon Hathorn, "Sarah Bernhardt's visits to Canada: Dates and Repertory," in Histoire du theatre au Canada/Theatre History in Canada 2, no. 2 (Fall 1981): 93-116.

26. Although the main battles took place in 1837 (under Louis-Joseph Papineau) and 1838 (led by Robert Nelson), trouble had been brewing in Lower Canada much earlier when Papineau first inspired the French population with his fiery speeches in the Quebec Assembly. The discontent was expressed in a series of resolutions 122

27. 28. 29. 30.

31.

32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37.

38. 39.

Notes in which Les Patriotes proposed, among other things, boycotting all English products (whence came the general use of locally made clothing such as toques and multi-coloured belts) and even advocated armed insurrection with the aim of independence. Sir Charles Lucas, ed., Lord Durham's Report on the Affairs of British North America (New York: Augustus M. Kelly, 1970). Marcel Rioux, "Des colonises tranqulement conservateurs," in La Question du Quebec (Paris: Editions Seghers, 1971), pp. 75-100. Massicotte, "Les Theatres et les lieux," p. 88. In October, this event was not only discussed at length in the newspapers but was also the cause of the issuing of an ordinance forbidding theatres to remain open after eleven p.m. (Hare, p. 77). In addition government workers were told not to attend "representations en francais." Jean Laflamme, Remi Tourangeau, Le Fantasque, vol. II, no. 12 (November 13, 1839), p. 93, quoted by Jean Laflamme, Remi Tourangeau, L'Eglise (p. 120). Of course, we are referring here to an image of reality that, as historians and sociologists agree, became so engrained in the collective psyche of the elite and habitants alike that the French Canadians slowly began developing what Marcel Rioux refers to as an ideology of conservation: "Le desespoir s'est installe chez les plus engages des Quebecois. II ne s'agit plus pour eux de conduire le peuple a I'independance mais de lutter contre 1'assimilation, contre ranglicisation la nouvelle ideologic qui va s'elaborer marque un tragique retrecissement. Sentant bien qu'ils allaient devenir minoritaires, les Quebecois vont se fixer comme objectif non plus de devenir une societe independante mais de conserver leur culture" (Marcel Rioux, p. 78). See Rene Dionne, "Le Jeune Latour d'Antoine Gerin-Lajoie," in Archives des kttres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds. Paul Wyczynski et al. (Montreal: Fides 1976), pp. 119-25. Ibid., p. 121. Paul Wyczynski, "Louis Frechette et le theatre," in Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds. Paul Wyczynski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), pp. 137-65. Jean-Claude Noel, "Le Theatre de Pierre Petitclair," in Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds. Paul Wyczynski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), pp. 127-36. Edouard G. Rinfret, Le Theatre canadien d'expresston francaise, vol. 3, (Montreal: Lemeac, 1977), p. 47. Marchand's honest nationalism was revived as a symbol and focus for the Quiet Revolution generation by Jean-Claude Germain. His modern adaptation of Les Faux Brillants was produced at the Theatre d'aujourd'hui in 1977. Germain's version celebrates the inate goodness of common folk in general and the good people of Quebec in particular as opposed to the elitist snobs of France and Europe. Houle, L'Histoire du theatre au Canada, pp. 123-35; Hare, "Panorama des spectacles au Quebec," pp. 90-1. Germain Beaulieu, "Soirees de femille," LAnnuaire theatral 1908-1909, pp. 58-68. 123


40. Beraud, 350 cms, p. 113. 41. Betty Lee, Lave and Whiskey (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1973), pp. 64-76. 42. Beraud, 350 ans, p. 126. For an insight into the information and development of several amateur groups of the period, see Leopold Houle, L'Histoire du theatre au Canada, pp. 123-135. 43. John Hare, "Le Theatre professionnel a Montreal de 1898 a 1937," in Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds. Paul Wyczynski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), p. 244. 44. Jean-Claude Germain, "Ernest Guimond, 1897-1977. Un Grand Comedien dans une petite epoque," in Le Pays theatral 1, no. 1 (1977-1978). 45. Gae'tan Dostie, "En 57 ans de carriere, a ecrit 40 pieces et 300 textes de radio," Perspectives, April 13, 1974, pp. 18-24; Edouard Rinfret, Le Theatre canadien d'expression francaise, vol. 2 (Montreal: Lemeac 1976), pp. 142-62. 46. Rinfret, Le Theatre candien d'expressbn francaise, vol. 1 (Montreal: Lemeac, 1975), pp. 284-5. 47. Rinfret, Le Theatre, vol. 2, pp. 176-9. 48. Beraud, 350 ans, p. 113. 49. In 1970-1971, Jean-Claude Germain made riotous fun of both the play and the period in which it was produced in two collective creations: Si Aurore m'etait contee deux fois and La mise a mort d'la Miss des Miss. His modern day satire of Quebec's Reactionary Religious and Social Institutions indicate that the influence of the church and its moral teachings was not only long standing but far reaching in Quebec society. The original version of this play was finally published in 1982 with an introduction by Alonso Le Blanc: Leon Petitjean; Henri Rollin, Aurore, I'enfant Martyre (Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1982). 50. Pierre Page, Repertoire des oeuvres de la litterature radiophonique quebecoise, 1930-1970 (Montreal: Fides, 1975); Renee Legris and Pierre Page, "Le Theatre a la radio et a la television," in Archives des letters canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds. Paul Wyczynski et al (Montreal: Fides, 1976), pp. 291-381. 51. Laflamme and Tourangeau, L'Egtise, p. 306. 52. Hare, "Le Theatre professionnel a Montreal de 1898 a 1937," p. 247.

PART II

1. Marcel Rioux has classified Duplessis as the very personification of feudal conservatism and sordid jingoism: "Celui qui. . . symbolise le conservatisme feodal et le chauvinisme le plus mesquin . . . ", La Question du Quebec, p. 101. 2. Albert Faucher and Maurice Lamontagne, "History of Industrial Development," in French-Canadian Society, ed. Marcel Rioux, Yves Martin, vol. 1 (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1971), pp. 257-71. 3. Pierre Elliot Trudeau, ed., La Greve de 1'amiante (Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1970).

124

4.

5. 6.

7.

8. 9.

Notes The hermetic work of at least one of them, poet and playwright Claude Gauvreau, was controversial even in the 1970s. Claude Gauvreau used physical and verbal cruelty, obsenities and surrealistic images of ugliness and sadism to reach into the workings of the mind and the groteseque nature of the world in two of his plays (probably written in the mid-fifties) which were finally produced by the Theatre du Nouveau Monde in the seventies: La Charge de I'orignal epormyable (The Charge of the Mighty Moose) in May 1970 and Les Oranges sont vertes (The Oranges Are Green) in January 1972. Gilles Gagnon, "Le Theatre des Compagnons," Culture 30 (1959): 129-45. Emile Legault, Confidences (Montreal: Fides, 1955); "Quelques notes sur les Compagnons de Saint-Laurent (1937-1952)," in Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds. Paul Wycyznski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), p. 249-66. Legault was particularly inspired by the religious theatre of Henri Gheon, French author of Le Mystere de la messe (The Mystery of the Mass) and Noel sur la place (Christmas in the Market Place). Legault even managed to have Gheon visit the college in 1938 and direct one of his own plays, Le Jeu de St-Laurent du fleuve (The Play of St. Lawrence of the River). Anne Caron, Le Pere Emile Legault et le theatre au Quebec (Montreal: Fides, 1978), pp. 181-184. The avant-garde plays first produced did not command large audiences. By the time L'Equipe started presenting works with a broader appeal, the company's financial troubles were insurmountable. It folded in 1947. Hamelin, Le Renouveau, pp. 31-41.

10. Ibid., pp. 66-9. 11. Beraud, 350 ans, pp. 263, 273. 12. Ibid., pp. 279-80.

13. Ibid., p. 225.

14. The reviews were bad, however, and the play was forced to close for lack of an audience. Ibid., pp. 234-5. 15. Rinfret, Le Theatre, vol. 2, pp. 210-13. 16. Ibid., pp. 321-31. 17. Ibid., pp. 359-63.

18. Rinfret, Le Theatre, vol. 3, pp. 52-4. 19. Rinfret, Le Theatre, vol. 2, pp. 262-88. 20. Jeanne Corriveau, "Le Theatre collegial au Quebec: 1'apport de Gustave Lamarche," in Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadienfrancais, eds, Paul Wycyznski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), pp. 169-200. 21. Louis-Martin Tard, Vingt ans de theatre au Nouveau Monde, (Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1971); Hamelin, Le Theatre du Canada francais (Quebec-. Ministere des Affoires culturelles, 1964), pp. 15-20. 22. Theatre du Nouveau Monde, Archives. 23. Tard, pp. 56-58. 24. Hamelin, Le Theatre au Canada francais, pp. 20-3. 25. The TNM moved to the Orpheum in 1957 and in 1967 to the well equipped Theatre Port Royal at the Place des Arts. In 1973, it established its permanent home in the former Comedie-Canadienne. 125


26. Theatre-Club, personal archives of Monique Lepage. 27. Hamelin, Le Theatre, pp. 36-38; Madeleine Greffard, "Les Apprentis-Sorciers," Nord, no. 4-5 (1972-1973); 135-50. 28. After more than 150 performances the Apprentis-Sorciers disbanded in 1968. The group had concentrated on contemporary drama on a small scale, but had slowly been overshadowed by the larger companies and their more varied repertoire. 29. Hamelin, Le Theatre, pp. 25-8; Raynald Desmeules "Rideau Vert: Quality and Permanence," The Stage in Canada 5, no. 9 (1970): 4-10. 30. Although boulevard comedy was its main bill of fare, the Theatre du Rideau Vert did periodically stage such modern classics as Behan's L'Otage (The Hostage, 1964) and Sartre's Huis Clos (No Exit, 1967). It also produced several Quebec works including Une Maison , . . un jour in 1965 and Les Belles-Soeurs in 1968. 31. By 1979, there were dose to a dozen theatres of varying sizes scattered across Quebec usually housed in converted bams. Among the best known were Henri Norbert'stheatre at Sun Valley, Marjolaine Hebert's Theatre de Marjolaine in Eastman, Paul Hebert's theatre at Sainte-Adele, Jean Duceppe's Theatre des Prairies near Joliette, Georges Camere's Theatre des Marguerites near Trois Rivieres, and George Delisle's La feniere, just outside Quebec City. Most of these theatres presented two plays a season, usually light comedies. Over thirty summer theatres were in operation in the summer of 1979. "Theatres d'ete," Repertoire theatral du Quebec 1979/80 (Montreal: Cahiers de Theatre Jeu, 1979, pp. 39-42. 32. Hamelin, Le Theatre, p. 28. 33. Beraud, 350 cms, p. 303. See also Pierre de Grandpre's rave review, "Aux festivals de Montreal L' 'Athalie' de Racine," Le Devoir, August 8, 1956, p. 7. 34. Tard, Vingt ans, p. 29. 35. Jack Kapica, "Jeanine Beaubien sits on a multicultural powderkeg," Performing Arts in Canada 11, no. 3 (1974): 25-6; Hamelin, Le Theatre, p. 35. 36. Ibid, pp. 32-5. 37. Albert Brie, "Un Entretien avec Gratien Gelinas," Le Devoir, May 12, 1973, pp. 15, 20; Jean-Cleo Godin, "Orphelins ou batards: Fridolin, Tit-Coq, Bousille," Le Theatre quebecois, ed. Jean-Cleo Godin and Laurent Mailhot (Montreal: HMH, 1970), pp. 29-43; Elaine Nardocchio, "Interview with Gratien Gelinas," (July 10, 1972), unpublished; "De Fridolin a Gelinas," Perspectives (November 15, 1969): 53. 38. Laurent Mailhot, "Les Fridolinades, spectacles et texte," in Gratien Gelinas, Les Fridolinades 1945 et 1946 (Montreal: Quinze, 1980), pp. 9-14. 39. Page, Repertoire des oeuvres de la litterature radiophonique quebecoise, pp. 291-381. 40. Legris and Page, "Le Theatre a la radio," pp. 291-318. 41. Theatre du Rideau Vert, Archives. 42. Laurent Mailhot, "Deux saisons dans la vie de la Nouvelle-France: Un Fils (ou un pere) a tuer," in Godin, Jean-Cheo, and Mailhot, Laurent, Le Theatre quebecois, pp. 45-58. 43. Yerri Kempf, Les Trois Coups a Montreal (Montreal: Deom, 1965), p. 342. 44. The TNM's Archives show that L'Oeil du peuple which was produced at the Orpheum, attracted close to 12,000 spectators and had 22 performances

126

45.

46. 47. 48. 49.

50. 51. 52. 53. 54. 55.

56. 57.

58.

Notes compared to 27,000 people and 53 performances for Guitry's Mon pere avait raison that same year. Political satire has certainly become much more accepted over the years as may be seen from the great success enjoyed in Quebec in 1970 by John Thomas McDonough's work in translation Charbonneau et le Chef which explicity paints Duplessis as a dictator. Gratien Gelinas, Tit-Coq (Montreal: Editions Beauchemin, 1950), p. 7. Bouselle et les justes was presented, for example, in English at the ComedieCanadienne in 1961. Including a production at the Charlottetown Festival in 1967. When the Comedie-Canadienne attempted to bring in American shows (Mixed Bag, Hair, etc.) audience support disappeared, the theatre lost money, was forced to declare bankruptcy in 1970, and ceased operations soon afterwards. It reopened in 1973 as the new home of the Theatre du Nouveau Monde. Paul Gay, "L'Itineraire de Languirand ou la reponse a 1'angoisse humaine," in Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds, Paul Wycyznski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), pp. 513-30. Theatre du Nouveau Monde, Archives. Maximilien Laroche, "Representations et succes de Zoner introduction to Marcel Dube, Zone (Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1969), pp. 9-10. Theatre-Club, Personal Papers of Monique Lepage. Approximately 35,000 spectators applauded Un Simple Soldat, while Le Temps des Was had an attendance figure of over 25,000 (Theatre Archives). Edwin G. Hamblet, Marcel Dube and French-Canadian Drama (New York: Exposition Press, 1970); Godin, "Mourir sa vie, vivre sa mort: le monde de Marcel Dube," Le Theatre quebecois, ed. Godin and Mailhot, pp. 81-108; Jocelyne Mathe, "Marcel Dube," in Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, eds. Paul Wycyznski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), pp. 497-512. In September 1966, one year after Dube's stage play Les Beaux Dimanches was produced at the tomedie-Canadienne, the television network of RadioCanada paid indirect tribute to Dube when it began broadcasting a Sunday evening program which it called Les Beaux Dimanches. Rinfret, Le Theatre, vol. 1 (1975), pp. 322-46. Before the Quiet Revolution, Quebec's middle class was primarily composed of members from the traditional professions of law and medicine. During the sixties a new middle class arose comprised of technicians, engineers, teachers, civil servants, business men, and others who had profited from the rapid modernization of Quebec. Hamblet, Marcel Dube.

PART III

1. Hugh B. Myers, The Quebec Revolution (Montreal: Harvest House, 1964). 2. See Jean-Claude Germain's view of this issue in "Theatre Quebecois or Theatre Protestant?" Canadwai Theatre Review, no. 11 (Summer 1976): 8-22. 127


3. The Union Nationale, the Liberals, and the Parti Quebecois all passed laws dealing with the use of French and English in Quebec: Bill 63, 1969 (An Act to Promote the Teaching of the French Language in Quebec); Bill 22, 1974 (The Official Language Act); Bill 101, 1977 (The Charter of the French Language). 4. Belair, Le Nouveau Theatre quebecois, p. 71. 5. Donald Smith, "The Anatomy of a Touring Company," The Stage in Canada 4, no. 8 (1968): 8-13. 6. Guy Beaulne, "Fondation," feu 15 (1980:2): 21-7. 7. Hamelin, Le Theatre, p. 38. 8. Les Saltimbanques, Personal Archives, of Rodrig Mathieu; Michel Vais, "Les Saltimbanques (1962-1969)," Jeu 2 (Spring 1976): 22-44. 9. It also regularly mounted Quebecois works such as Guy Dufresne's Le Cri de I'engoulevent in 1971, Yves Sauvageau's Wouf, wouf in 1974, and Rejean Ducharme's Ines Peree et Inat Tendu in 1976. 10. More than 11,000 students subscribed in 1964 and by 1969, the number had risen to over 25,000. Adrien Gruslin, "1,327 representations devant 1,083,339 personnes," Le Devoir, January 4, 1975, p. 16. 11. Helene Beauchamp-Rank, "Paul Buissonneau," in Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadian-francais, eds. Paul Wycyznski et al. (Montreal: Fides, 1976), pp. 840-41. 12. Jean-Claude Germain, "A Trying Centre for Drama," The Stage in Canada 5, no. 1 (1969): 8-12. 13. Ben Shek, "Quebec's New Playwrights Go Natural With a Little Bit of Help From C.E.A.D.," Performing Arts in Canada (Summer 1974): 19-20. 14. Gilbert David, Claude Des Landes, Marie-France Des Landes, Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques 1965-1975 (Montreal: CEAD, 1975), pp. 46-78. For information on Antonine Maillet, see Notes, Part IV, no. 11, pp. 128. 15. For a listing of professional theatre productions in Montreal and a discussion of the French-Canadian and Quebecois plays of the period, see Elaine F. Nardocchio, "1958-1968: Ten Formative Years in Quebec's Theatre History" Canadian Drama/L'art Dramatique Canadien 12, no. 1 (Spring 1986): 1-24. See also Pierre Lavoie "Quebec/bilan tranquille d'une revolution theatrale," Jeu 6 (Summer/Fan 1977): 47-61. 16. Rinfret, Le Theatre, vol. 1, pp. 351-55. 17. Claude Prefontaine, Personal Papers. 18. Theatre du Nouveau Monde, Archives. 19. Tard, Vingt ans, p. 82. 20. L'Estoc was founded in 1957 and became a professional troupe in 1963. The attendance figure (in a theatre of 126 seats and then in one seating 670) varied from 35 to 70 per cent capacity, although this latter figure was quite unusual. Michel Richard, "L'Estoc: A Matter of Mere Survival," The Stage in Canada 3, no. 1 (1968): 6-9. 21. Mailhot, "L'Execution," Livres et auteurs quebecois 1968, pp. 72-3; Dassylva, "Meurtre (gratuit) au college," Un Theatre en effervescence (Montreal: Editions La Presse, 1975), pp. 45-7. 22. Laurent Mailhot, "Le Theatre 'maghane' de Rejean Ducharme," Le Theatre quebecois, pp. 203-23; Dassylva, "Rejean Ducharme," Un Theatre, pp. 71-80. 128

23.

24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29.

30.

31.

32. 33. 34.

35.

Notes For example, Ines Peree et Inat Tendu was performed by the Organisation O in May 1976, Le Cid maghane was presented at the Centre d'essai de 1'Universitie de Montreal in February 1977, and in the spring of the same year Le Marquis qui perdit appeared at the CEGEP Bourgchemin in Saint-Hyacinth. 17,000 spectators witnessed the play in Montreal; another 28,000 saw it during its tour of the province, TNM, Archives. 10,762 people over twenty-nine performances of La Dalle-des-Morts, as compared, for example, with 18,484 and thirty-five shows for the 1965 production of Klondyke. Theatre du Nouveau Monde, Archives. 22,633 spectators and thirty-four performances. Ibid. In 1970, the Theatre Populate du Quebec included the play in its tour schedule and it was performed by the Nouvelle Compagnie Theatrale at the Gesu in 1971. Dufresne later began writing for television. Les Forges de Saint-Maurice (The Saint Maurice Iron Works) was one of his most popular contributions to this medium. It ran as a series for several years in the seventies. Apt 2967 was produced in 1967 in Venice, A coeur ouvert in Greece in 1971, Le Proces de Jean-Baptiste M. in France in 1975, and Le Champion in Upper Volta in 1978. Gruslin, "Robert Gurik: mon theatre pose des questions," Le Devoir, May 13, 1978, p. 26. Two days before the play closed, one man disrobed and killed a rooster on stage much to everyone's horror. A small-scale police investigation followed and a general stir was raised in the media, all of which added to the play's reputation. Dassylva, "Le Nouveau Realisme (?) des Belles-Soeurs et le joual," La Presse, September, 14, 1968, p. 28; Andre Major, "Les Belles-Soeurs en francais? non merci!" Le Devoir, September 26, 1968, p. 13. J.-P. Dumesnel, "Quand le joual bave au Rideau Vert," Le Devoir, September 24, 1968, p. 12. It was revived for instance, by the Theatre du Rideau Vert in Montreal in August 1969 and in May 1971 in Quebec City, by the Compagnie des DeuxChaises in November 1973, and by the Theatre du Nouveau Monde in 1974. For a discussion by Brassard of the problems involved in staging Tremblay's work, see the interview with him by Renate Usrniani, "Andre Brassard Discovering the Nuances," Canadian Theatre Review, no. 24 (Fall, 1979): 38-41. Dominique Lafon has analysed in detail the geneology of the characters that appear and reappear in his plays and in his novels, "Dramaturgie et ecriture romanesque chez Tremblay. La genealogie d'un autre lyrisme," Jeu 21 (1981.4): 95-103. In May 1980, the Theatre du Nouveau Monde produced a new and different Tremblay play, L'Impromptu d'Outremont, This piece does not feature any of the working poor or familiar underground characters from Tremblay's world. On the contrary, the setting is the house four sisters were brought up in, in Outremont, for many years the bastion of Montreal's French-language middle class. Three of the sisters have remained in Outremont (the two unmarried ones live together in the family home). The fourth has fled their stilted world and moved to the Italian ghetto of St.-Leonard with an unsophisticated Italian gardener she has chosen to marry.

129


None of the sisters has been willing to accept the new Quebec culture of the sixties and the seventies. While sharing afternoon tea and quietly celebrating the birthday of one of them, they all speak a bland, anonymous French and enjoy talking about European classical music, literature, and theatre although none of them has developed any real-life talent of her own. Tremblay clearly resents this cultural and economic narrow-minded elite which in many ways represents the antithesis of the poor, dissatisfied characters he depicts with such sympathy in his other more popular, working-class plays.

PART IV

1. PQ campagn publicity posters bore such slogans as "Ca ne peut pas continuer comme ga" (This can't go on), and "On meritait mieux que ca" (We deserved better). 2. Louise Nantel, "Centre d'essai le Conventum. Line Tentative de doisonnement," Jeu 12 (Summer 1979): 124-29. 3. Leblanc, "La Tradition theatrale a Quebec, 1790-1973," pp. 233-38. Fernand Villemure, "Le Trident: au compte de dix. De '0-71" aux "sept peches quebecois"Jeu 18 (1981:1): 47-64. 4. Le Theatre du Trident, Archives. 5. Ibid. 6. Ibid. 7. Femand Villemure, "Le Cafe-theatre a Quebec," Jeu 12 (Summer 1979): 138-56. 8. Helene Beauchamp, "Le Theatre a la p'tite ecole," (Quebec: Ministere des Affaires Culturelles: Reprographie du bureau de I'editeur officiel, 1978), p. 16. 9. Helene Beauchamp, "Repertoire des festivals de theatre pour 1'enfance et la jeunesse, Jeu 15 (1980:2): 171-86. 10. Several Quebec dramatists were given public readings in April 1976 at the Theatre de la Cite universitaire. They were: Roger Dumas (Les Millionaires), Jean Morin (Vive I'empereur), Michel Garneau (Rare), Marc Gelinas (Qu'on I'ecoute), Robert Gurik (Le Pendu), Jacques Collin (Et docile et matin), Michel Trembly (En pieces detachees), Yvon Lelieve (Jeeeeeeesus). "Le Theatre 'joual* a interesse les Francais," Le Soleil, May 8, 1976, p. 29. 11. In "Le theatre quebecois en Europe" (]eu (1981:4): 115-128) Michel Va'is lists sewn European tours by Quebec companies during the 1960s and the production of four Quebec plays. For the 1970-1980 period, Vais cites over twenty-eight visits by Quebec troupes almost exclusively performing Quebec works. One exception was Moliere's Tartuffe in 1971, produced by the Theatre du Nouveau Monde. The others were performances by the Theatre du Rideau Vert of plays by Antonine Maillet. Antonine Maillet is not, strictly speaking, a Quebecois writer. Although she lived in Montreal, and had most of her works premiered there, her plays are set in New Brunswick and are concerned with Acadian nationalism and mythology. But the extraordinary vigour and expressiveness of her language and the rich folk quality of her stories made her internationally known, thus adding to the 130

12. 13. 14. 15.

16. 17. 18.

19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27.

Notes prestige of all French-Canadian writers. Maillet's most famous stage play, La Sagouine, toured Europe in 1976. This play along with Evangeline Deusse and Gapi were produced by the Theatre du Rideau Vert in the summer of 1978. When Maillet won the important Prix Goncourt in France, in 1979, for her novel Pelagie-la-Charette she contributed once again to the ever increasing international prestige of French-Canadian culture and language. Villemure, "Aspects de la creation collective au Quebec," Jeu 4 (Winter 1977): 57-71. Pierre Lavoie, "Bio-Biblipgraphie: Theatrographie," Jeu 13 (Fall 1979): 108-124. Even after the TMN ceased to function as a group, the Centre du Theatre d'Aujourd'hui continued, as a playhouse, to produce other works by Quebec authors and especially those of Jean-Claude Germain. The Grand Cirque Ordinaire was established as the result of the merger, in the Fall of 1969, of two groups. The first was formed in 1965 and included Garceau, Baillargeon, and Thauvette. The second group, which included Prevost and Roy presented a collective creation Pot. T.V. in the Spring of 1969. This performance so enthused Raymond Cloutier, the eventual founder/leader of the GCO that -he spoke to them about the possibility of forming a troupe in the Fall of 1969: "J'ai ete seduit comme un fou; j'ai rencontre Claude, Paule et je leur ai dis que je partais en Europe mais que je revenais au mois de septembre et qu'on ferait de quoi," Gilbert David, Lorraine Hebert, Yolande Villemaire, "Entretien(s)," Jeu 5 (Spring, 1977): 22. See also: Raymond Cloutier, "Petite histoire," Jeu 5 (Spring 1977): 7-16. Claude Des Landes, "Productions et documents," Jeu 5 (Spring 1977): 93. Ibid., 96, In the case of Jeanne d'Arc, over eighty percent of the first thirty or forty public performances were improvised onstage. The show continued to be modified in this way throughout its 1969-1970 tour. Gilbert David, Lorraine Hebert, Yolande Villemaire, "Entretiens," Jeu 5 (Spring 1977): 19. Ibid., 4403. Ben Shek, "En francais, Le Grand Cirque Ordinaire," in Performing Arts in Canada 10, no. 4 (Winter 1973): 19. Four times, by the Trident, at the Palais Montcalm and thirty-five performances at the Theatre de Quat'Sous. Ibid., 97. Twenty performances at the Theatre de la Main and three times at Cinema Outremont. Ibid. Jacques Larue-Langlois, "Le Parminou: le theatre de la societe," Le Devoir, October 18 1980, p. 28. Lorraine Hebert, Gilbert David, "Le Theatre Parminou: 1'argent fait-y vot' bonheur?"/ Jeu 1(Winter 1976): 25-74. Gerald Sigouin, "Orientation et mutations du theatre . . . Euh!" Part I: Jeu 2 (Spring 1976): 55-81; Part II: Jeu 3 (Spring/Fall 1976): 14-45. Michel Vais, Monique Duplantie, Paul Lefebvre, "L'Eskabel," feu 14 (1980:1): 43-74. "Theatre experimental de Montreal, Manifesto," feu 8 (Spring 1978): 118-121; Jean-Pierre Ronfard often worked with and for the TEM but he was not a 131


28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33.

34. 35. 36. 37. 38.

39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46.

permanent member of the original group. His name did not appear in the TEM's "Manifesto." Joyce Cunningham, and Mil Lefebvre, "Improvisation and the NHL," Canadian Theatre Review 25 (Winter 1980): 79-81. Helene Beauchamp et al. "A.C.T.A./A.Q.J.T.: un theatre intervenant, 1958-1980," feu 15 (1980:2): 7-187. La Gaboche, le Theatre Euh!, Le Tic Tac Boom, Les Gens d'en Bas, le comite de direction de 1'A.Q.J.T., "Manifeste pour un theatre au service du peuple," in feu 7 (Winter 1978): 78-88. 6,127 spectators applauded Alceste in 1972 as compared to 1972 attendance figures at the Trident for Charbonneau et k Chef (11,269), and Eloi de Grandmont's adaptation of Pygmalion (28,114). Le Theatre du Trident, Archives. Denis Saint-Jacques, "L'Exemple d'Alcide ler," Nord 4-5 (Fall 1972/Winter 1973): 29-37. Another novel adapted for the stage, Floralie ou es tu? (Theatre du Nouveau Monde, April 1974) is not particularly political but rather offers short sketches of the rough but picturesque village where mother Corriveau and Anthyme grew up and includes poetic images of the French-Canadian psyche. Attendance figure was 20,062. Theatre du Nouveau Monde, Archives, Catherine Lord, "Que Reprochez-vous a Blanche-Neige?" Chatelaine July 1974): 30-38. The attendance figure was 25,671. Theatre du Nouveau Monde, Archives. Yolande Villemaire, "Autour de La Nef des Sorcwresr Jeu 2 (Spring 1976): 15-21. In May 1980 the first Women Writers Festival took place in Montreal (Festival de creations de femmes) and included theatre performance and workshops. Larue-Langlois, "Au theatre experimental des Femmes, du 12 mai au 6 juin. Un premier festival de creation de femmes," Le Devoir, May 17, 1980, p. 28. Lawrence Sabbath, "Censorship in Montreal," Canadian Theatre Review (Fall 1978): 81-5; Denise Boucher, Les Fees ont soif, pp. 21-66. Theatre du Nouveau Monde, Archives. Use Armstrong, and Johanne Monegeon, "Bemadette et Juliette Les Pichous," Jeu 14 (1980:1): 149-157. It was a hit at the Festival de Nancy in 1980 and was taken to several cities in France in 1981. Alonzo Leblanc, "La Tradition theatrale a Quebec 1790-1973," pp. 228-30. Jean-Cleo Godin, "Anti-heroes a la Barbeau," Godin, Mailhot, ed., Le Theatre quebecois II (Montreal: HMH, 1980), p. 92. Donald Smith, "Jean Barbeau, dramaturge" Lettres Quebecoises, no. 5 (February 1977): 38. Albert Millaire also mentions the TPQ/GCO relationship in his introduction to Ben-Ur (Montreal: Lemeac, 1971), p. 5. Jeu 13 (Fall 1979) deals almost exclusively with Germain's work and contains a detailed list of his plays: Thedtrographie, pp. 108-24.

132

Selected Bibliography

"This bibliography lists the most important works of theatrical and socio-historical research published before 1981. No systematic attempt has been made to add the names of books and articles that appeared after that date although some outstanding works have been listed. In all cases, an asterisk indicates the most comprehensive and the most easily accessible historical studies and overviews of theatre in Quebec. FRENCH-LANGUAGE TEXTS

*Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais, Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Archives Nationales du Quebec (Quebec City). Le Bulletin des recherches historiques (Levis) 41, no. 11 (November 1936): 642-66. Le Bulletin des recherches historiques (Levis) 41, no. 12 (December 1936): 184-8. .Le Bulletin des recherches historiques (Levis) 42, no. 2 (February 1937): 33-45. Le Bulletin des rechercheshistoriques(Levis) 42, no. 3 (March 1937): 64-70. .Le Bulletin des recherches historiques (Levis) 42, no. 4 (April 1937): 97-101. Armour, Romeo, "Le Theatre de Neptune de Marc Lescarbot," In Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al., pp. 26-29. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Armstrong, Lise and Mongeon, Johanne. "Bemadette et Juliette Les Pichous." Jeu 14 (1980:1): 149-157.

La Barre du jour 1, nos. 3-5 (July-December, 1965). Theme Issue: "Theatre-Quebec." Beauchamp, Helene. "Repertoire des festivals de theatre pour I'enfence et la jeunesse." Jeu 15 (1980:2): 171-86. ."Le Theatre a la p'tite ecole." Quebec: Ministere des Affaires Culturelles: Reprographie du bureau de L'Editeur officiel, 1978. Beauchamp, Helene, et al. "ACTA/AQJT: Un theatre 'intervenant' (1958-1980)." Jeu 15 (1980:2): 7-187. Beauchamp-Rank, Helene. "Paul Buissonneau.' In Archives des lettres canadennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-frangais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al., pp. 840-41. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Beaulieu, Germain. "Soirees de famille." In L'Annuaire theatral 1908-1909. Edited by Georges Robert, pp. 58-68. Beaulieu, Michel, "Le joual c'est la substance meme de notre drame." Perspectives, La Presse, February 17, 1973, pp. 6, 8, 9. Beaulne, Guy. "Fondation." feu 15 (1980:2): 21-7. 133


Belair, Michel. Michel Trembkty, Montreal: Les Presses de 1'Universite du Quebec, 1972. Le Nouveau Theatre quebecois. Montreal: Lemeac, 1973. Bellerive, Georges. Nos auteurs dramatiques. Quebec: Editions Gameau, 1933. Beraud, Jean. Initiation a I'art dramatique. Paris: Editions Figuiere, 1934. 350 ans de theatre au Canada, francais. Montreal: Le Cercle du Livre de France, 1958. Beraud, Jean, Franque, Leon, and Valois, Marcel. Variations sur trois themes. Montreal: Les Editions Fernand Pilon, 1946. Borduas, Paul. Le Be/us global. Montreal: n.p., 1946. Boutet, Edgar. 85 ans de theatre a Huff, Hull: Societe historique de 1'ouest du Quebec, 1969. Brie, Albeit. "Un Entretien avec Gratien Gelinas." Le Devoir, May 12, 1972, p. 20. *Burger, Baudouin. L'Activite theatrale au Quebec: 1765-1825. Montreal: Parti Pris, 1974. "Les Spectacles dramatiques en Nouvelle-France (1606-1760)." In Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al., pp. 33-57. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Camerlain, Loraine. "Chronologie fragmentaire des creations quebecoises depuis 1975." feu 21 (1981:4): 129-169.

*Caron, Anne. Le Pere Emile Legault et le theatre au Quebec. Montreal: Fides, 1978. Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques. Repertoire 65-68. Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1969. __.TheatrelQuebec. Vol. 1. Montreal: Centre d'essai des anteurs dramatiques, 1970.

Cfoutier, Raymond. "Petite historie," Jeu 5 (Spring, 1977): 7-16. Colbert, David, Hebert, Lorraine, and Villemaire, Yolande. "Entretien(s)."Jeu (Spring, 1977): 17-32. Corriveau, Jeanne. "Le Theatre collegia! au Quebec: 1'apport de Gustave Lamarche." In Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al, pp. 169-202. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Cotnam, Jacques. Le Theatre quebecois: instrument de contestation sociale et politique. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Crete, Jean-Pierre. Francoise Loranger. La Recherche d'une identity, Montreal: Lemeac, 1974. Dassylva, Martial. Un Theatre en effervescence: critiques et chroniques, 1965-1972. Montreal: Editions La Presse, 1975. David, Gilbert, Des Landes, Claude, and Des Landes, Marie-France. Le Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1960-1975. Montreal: C.E.A.D., 1975. David, Gilbert, Hebert, Lorraine, and Villemaire, Yolande. "Entretiens" Jeu 5 (Spring 1977): 17-31.

Des Landes, Claude. "Productions et documents." Jeu 5 (Spring 1977): 92-103. "Theatrographie de Michel Gameau, ne a Montreal, le 25 avril 1939." Jeu 3 (Summer-FaD, 1976): 60-1. *Deschamps, Marcel, and Tremblay, Denys. Dossier en theatre quebecois: bibliographie. Jonquiere: C.E.G.E.P, de Jonquiere, 1972. Dionne, Rene. "Le Jeune Latour d'Antoine Gerin-Lajoie." In Archives des lettres canadiermes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al., pp. 119-26. Montreal: Fides, 1976. 134

Bibliography *Doat, Jan. Anthobgie du theatre quebecois, 1600-1970. Quebec: Editions La Liberte, 1973. Theatre, portes ouvertes. Montreal: Le Cercle du Livre de France, 1970. Dostie, Gaetan. "En 57 ans de carriere, il ecrit 40 pieces et 300 textes de radio." Perspectives, April 13, 1974, pp. 18-24. Dube, Marcel. Textes et documents. Montreal: Lemeac, 1968. La Tragedie est un acte defoi. Montreal: Lemeac, 1973. *DuBerger, Jean. "Bibliographie du theatre quebecois de 1935 a nos jours." Nord 4-5 (Fall 1972-Winter 1973): 207-28. "L'Anglomanie." In Dictionnaire des Oeuvres Utteraires du Quebec. Tome I, p. 31. Montreal: Fides, 1978. Duciaume, Jean-Marcel. "Le Theatre de Gauvreau: une approche." Livres et auteurs quebecois (1972): 327-340. Duval, Etienne. Anthobgie thematique du theatre quebecois au XIX6 siecle. Montreal: Lemeac, 1978. Aspects du theatre quebecois. Annales de 1'ACFAS. Trois-Rivieres: Universite du Quebec a Trois-Rivieres, 1978. "Euh!" Nord 4-5 (Fall 1972-Winter 1973). "Le Theatre au Special Issue entitled: Quebec 1950-1972," pp. 47-58. Gagnon, Gilles. "Le Theatre des Compagnons." Culture 30 (1959): 129-45. Gay, Paul. "L'ltineraire de Languirand ou la reponse a 1'angoisse humaine." In Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al., pp. 513-30. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Gelinas, Gratien. Les Fridolinades 1945. Montreal: Quinze, 1980. .Les Fridolinades 1941 et 1942. Montreal: Quinze, 1981. Les Fridolinades 1943 et 1944. Montreal: Quinze, 1981. Germain, Jean-Claude. "Ernest Guimond, 1897-1977. Un Grand Comedien dans une petite epoque." Le Pays thedtreal 1, no. 1 (1977-1978). Gobin, Pierre. Le Fou et ses doubles. Montreal: Les Presses de 1'Universite de Montreal, 1978. *Godin, Jean-Cleo, and Mailhot, Laurent. Le Theatre quebecois: Introductbn a dix dramaturges contemporains. Montreal: HMH, 1970. Theatre quebecois, II. Montreal: HMH, 1980. Gouin, Olivier-Mercier. Comediens de notre temps. Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1967. Graham, Franklin. Histrionic Montreal. Montreal: John Lovell and Son, 1902. Grandmont, Eloi de, Hudon, Normand, and Roux, Jean-Louis. Dix ans de theatre au Nouveau Monde. Montreal: Lemeac, 1961. Gruslin, Adrien. Le Theatre et I'etat au Quebec. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1981. ."Dix ans de creation collective: c'est singulier! Entretien avec le Parminou." Jeu 28 (1983:3): 111-130. Hamelin, Jean. Le Renouveau du theatre du Canada frarcais. Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1961. .Le Theatre du Canada francais. Quebec: Ministere des Affaires culturelles, 1964. Hare, John E. "Panorama des spectacles au Quebec: de la Conquete au XXe siecle." In Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al., pp. 59-108. Montreal: Fides, 1976.

135


"Le Theatre professionnel a Montreal de 1898 a 1937." In Archives des kttres candiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al., pp. 239-48. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Hayne, David M. "Le Theatre de Joseph Quesnel." In Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al., pp. 109-118. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Hebert, Chantal, Le Burlesque au Quebec. Un divertissement populaire. Montreal: HMH, 1981. Hebert, Lorraine, and David, Gilbert. "Le Theatre Parminou: 1'argent foit-y vot' bonheur?" Jeu 1 (Winter, 1976): 25-74. Houle, Leopold. L'Histoire du theatre au Canada. Montreal: Fides, 1945. Huston, John. Le Repertoire national. Montreal: J.M. Valois et Cie., 1893. Kempf, Yerri. Les Trois Coups a Montreal. Montreal: Deom, 1965. Jeu 5 (Spring, 1977). Theme issue on Le Grand Cirque Ordinaire. Jeu 13 (Fall, 1979). Theme issue on Jean-Claude Germain. Jeu. Repertoire theatral du Quebec 1979/80. Theatres/troupes/nouveaux auteurs. Gilbert David, coord. Montreal: Cahiers de theatre Jeu, 1979. Repertoire theatre du Quebec 1981. Montreal: Cahiers de theatre Jeu, 1981. Laflamme, Jean, and Tburangeau, Remi. L'Egtise et le theatre au Quebec. Montreal: Fides, 1979. Lafon, Dominique. "Dramaturgie et ecriture romanesque chez Tremblay. Le genealogie d'un autre lyrisme." Jeu 21 (1981:4): 95-103. La Gaboche et. al.,"Manifeste pour un theatral au service du public." Jeu 7 (Winter, 1978): 79-88. Laquerre, Raymond, and Lavoie, Pierre, editeurs. Repertoire anatytique de I'activite theatral au Quebec 1978-1979. Montreal: Theatrotheque de L'Universite de Montreal et Editions Lemeac, 1981. Laroche, Maximilien. Marcel Dube. Montreal: Fides, 1970. . "Le Colonialisme dans les litteratures du Quebec et d'Haiti.'' Laurentian University Review/Revue de I'Universite Lawentienne, 9, no. 1 (Novembre, 1976): 51-69. Larue-Langlois, Jacques. "Le Parminou: le theatre de la societe." Le Devoir, 18 October 1980, p. 28. Lavoie, Pierre. "Bio-Bibliographie: "Theatrographie." Jeu 13 (Fall, 1979): 108-24. Leblanc, Alonso. "La Tradition theatrale a Quebec, 1790-1970." In Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al., pp. 203-238. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Legault, Pere Emile. Confidences. Montreal: Fides, 1955. ."Quelques notes sur les compagnons de Saint Laurent (1937-1952)." In Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al., pp. 249-266. Montreal: Fides, 1976.

"Perspectives sur Les Compagnons." Relations, October 5, 1945. Legris, Renee. "Jalons pour une analyse symbolique de la litteerature radiophonique quebecoise." In Problemes d'analyse symolique, pp. 185-202. Montreal: Les Presses de l'Universite du Quebec, 1972. Legris, Renee, and Page, Pierre. "Le Theatre a la radio et a la television." In Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al., pp. 291-318. Montreal: Fides, 1976.

136

Bibliography Lord, Catherine. "Que Reprochez-vous a Blanche-Neige?" Chatelaine (July 1974): 30-38.

Mailhot, Laurent. "L'Execution," Livres et auteurs quebecois 1968, pp. 72-3. Mailhot, Laurent and Melancon, Benoit. Le Conseil des Arts du Canada: 1957-1982. Montreal: Lemeac, 1982. Marcel, Jean. Jacques Ferron malgre lui. Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1970. Marion, Seraphim. "Le Tartufife et Mgr. de Saint-Vallier." In Lettres canadiennes d'autrefois, Vol. 8, pp. 15-31. Hull: Editions L'Eclair, 1954. Massicotte, E.Z. Recherches historiques sur les spectacles a Montreal de 1760 a 1800, pp. 113-122. Ottawa: Societe Royale du Canada, 1932. ."Les Theatres et les lieux d'amusements a Montreal pendant le dix-neuvieme sicle." In LAnnuaire theatral 1908-1909, ed. G. Robert, pp. 82-96. 1982. Mathe, Jocelyn, "Marcel Dube." In Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et al, pp. 497-512. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Moniere, Denis. Le Developpement des ideologies au Quebec. Montreal: Quebec/Amerique, 1977. Montpetit, Raymond, F. "La Construction des theatres a Montreal, au dix-neuvieme siecle. Critique de 1'historiograhie." In Aspects du theatre quebecois, ed. Etienne-F. Duval, pp. 41-56. Trois-Rivieres: Universite du Quebec a TroisRivieres, 1977. Nantel, Louise. "Centre d'essai le Conventum. Une Tentative de cloisonnement." Jeu 12 (Summer, 1979): 124-29. Nardocchio, Elaine F. "Les Grands Soleils de Jaques Ferron et la question du Quebec." Mosaic 14, no. 3 (1981): 113-117. .''Aspirations politiques, realite sociale et theatre quebecois: Les Grands Soleils de Jaques Ferron." Presence Francophone, no. 22 (Spring, 1981): 131-140. ."Espace scenique et societe quebecoise." Incidences 6, nos. 1-2 JanuaryAugust, 1982): 39-46. "Conscience sociale et questions rationales dans le theatre quebecois des annees 1960." Etudes CanadienneslCanadian Studies (1983:15): 31-38. ."Les Belles-Soeurs et la revolution tranquille." L'Action Nationale 60, no. 4, (December, 1980): 342-351. Noel, Jean-Claude. "Le Theatre de Pierre Petitclair." In Archives des lettres canadiennes, vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-francais. Edited by Paul Wyczynski et. al. pp. 127-36. Montreal: Fides, 1976. Nord 1 (Fall, 1971). Theme issue on Michel Tremblay. f 4-5 (Fall 1972 and Winter 1973). Theme issue-. "Le theatre au Quebec, 1950-1972." "Les Oranges sont vertes de Claude Gauvreau: un genie en feu," L'Envers du decor 4, no. 2 (November, 1971). Ouellet, Fernand. Le Bas Canada, 1791-1840, Ottawa: Editions de L'Universite d'Ottawa, 1976. mans. Patricia Claxton. .Elements d'historie sociale du Bos-Canada. Montreal: Cercle du Livre de France, 1966. .Lower Canada 1791-1840. Toronto: McCelland and Stewart, 1980. Page, Pierre. Le Comique et I'humour a la radio quebecoise 1930-1970. Montreal: La Presse, 1976. 137


Repertoire des oeuvres de fa titterature radiophonique quebecoise, 1930-1970. Montreal: Fides, 1975, *Page, Pierre, and Legris, Renee. Repertoire des oeuvres dramatiques quebecoises a fa television 1952-1977. Montreal: Fides, 1977. Pageau, Rene. Gustave Lamarche, poete dramatique. Quebec: Editions Gameau, 1976. Pavlovie, Diane. "Repertoire analytique de la n.c.t." Jeu 30 (1984:1): 164-173. *Pontaut, Alain. Dictonnaire critique du theatre quebecois. Montreal: Lemeac, 1972. Prevost, Robert. Que sont-ils deventis? Montreal: Editions Princeps, 1939. Quebec, Ministere des Affairs culturelles. Rapport annuel du Ministere des Affaires culturelles de la province de Quebec. Quebec: Ministere des Affaires culturelles, 1962-. Service du theatre, Releves statistiques des representations de theatre professionnel au Quebec. Quebec: Ministere des Affaires culturelles, 1967. *Rinfret, Edouard G. Le Theatre canadien d'expression francaise, Vols. 1-4. Montreal: Lemeac, 1975, 1976, 1977, 1978. Rioux, Marcel. La Question du Quebec. Paris: Editions Seghers, 1971. Trans. James Boake. Quebec in Question. Toronto: James Lorimer and Co., 1978. Robert, Georges, ed.L'Annuairetheatral 1908-1909. Ross, Line, and Tardiff, Helene. Le Teleroman quebecois 1960-1971. Quebec: Universite Laval, Department de sociologie, Laboratoire de recherches sociologiques, 1975. Roussan, Jacques de. Jacques Ferron. Montreal: Les Presses de 1'Universite du Quebec, 1971. *Sabourin, Jean-Guy. Les Vingt-cinq ans du TNM: son histoire par les textes, Vols 1-2. Montreal: Lemeac, 1976, 1977. Saint-Jacques, Denis. "L'Exemple d'Alcide ler." Nord 4-5 (Fall 1972 - Winter 1973): 29-37. Seguin, Robert-Lionel. "Les Divertissements." In La Vie libertine en Nouvetie-Frange au 17e siecle, pp. 217-24. Montreal: Lemeac, 1972. Shek, Ben. "En francais, le Grand Cirque Ordinaire." Performing Arts in Canada 10, no. 4 (Winter 1973): 16-19. Sigouin, Gerald. "Orientations et mutations du theatre . . . Euh!" Part 1: Jeu 2 (Spring, 1976): 55-81; Part 2: Jeu 3 (Summer/Fail 1976): 14-45. Theatre en lutte: le Theatre Euh! Montreal: VLB, 1982. Smith, Donald. "Jean Barbeau, dramaturge." Les lettres quebecoises, no. 5 (February, 1977). Suite, Benjamin. "LAncien Theatre canadien." In LAnnuaire theatral 1908-1909, Edited by Georges Robert. 1908. *Tard, Louis-Martin. Vingt ans de theatre au Nouveau Monde. Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1971. Toupin, Paul. L'Ecrivain et son theatre. Montreal: Le Cercle du Livre de France, 1964. Trudeau, Pierre Elliott, ed. La Greve de l'amiante. Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1970. Trans. James Boake. The Asbestos Strike. Toronto: James Lorimer, 1974. Vais, Michel. "Les Saltimbanques (1962-1969). Jeu 2 (Spring, 1976): 22-44. "Le theatre quebecois en Europe," Jeu (1981:4): 115-128. Vais, Michel, Duplantie, Monique and Lefebvre, Paul. "L'Eskabel."Jeu14 (1980:1): 43-74. Viau, Roger. Lord Durham. Montreal: HMH, 1962. 138

Bibliography Villemaire, Yolande. "AutDur de la Nef des Sorderes." Jeu 2 (Spring, 1976): 15-21. Villemure, Femand. "Aspects de la creation collective au Quebec." Jeu 4 (Winter, 1977): 57-71.

"Le Cafe-theatre a Quebec." jeu 12 (Summer, 1979): 138-56. "Le Trident: au compte de dix, De '0-71' aux 'sept peches quebecois'" Jeu 18 (1981:1): 47-64. Wade, Mason. Les Canadiens francais de 1760 a nos jours. Vol. I. Montreal: Cercie du livre de France. 1966. Trans. Adrien Venne and Francis Duau-LaBeyrie. The French Canadians: 1760-1945, Vol. I, (Updated]. Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1955. Weiller, Georgette. Sarah Bemhardt et le Canada. Quebec: Editions Athena, 1973. Wyczynski, Paul. "Louis Frechette et le theatre." In Archives des lettres canadiennes. vol. 5, Le Theatre canadien-frangais. Edited by Paul Wyczysnki et al, pp. 137-66. Montreal: Fides, 1976,

ENGLISH-LANGUAGE TEXTS

Anthony, Geraldine. In Stage Voices, pp. 275-311. Toronto: Doubleday, 1978. Bailey, Bruce "Theatre in La Belle Province." Canadian Fbrum 59, no. 9 (September, 1976): 18-19. Ball, John, and Plant, Richard. A Bibliography of Canadian Theatre History: 1583-1975. Toronto: Playwrights Co-op, 1976. A Bibliography of Canadian Theatre History: Supplement: 1975-76. Toronto: Playwrights Co-op, 1979. Clifford, N.K. "Religion and the Development of Canadian Society: An Historical Analysis." Church History 38, no. 4 (December, 1969): 506-23. Creative Canada. A Biographical Dictionary of Twentieth Century Creative and Performing Artists, Vols. 1-2. Comp. Reference Division, University of Victoria. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1972. Cunningham, Joyce. "Experimental Theatre in Montreal, 1978-1979." Canadian Drama/LArt dramatique canadien 6, no. 2 (Fall, 1980): 263-66. Cunningham, Joyce, and Lefebvre, Paul. "Improvisation and the NHL." Canadian Theatre Review 25 (Winter, 1980): 79-81. Desmeules, Raynald, ed. Theatre Yearbook, Un an de theatre 1965-1966. The Stage in Canada, La Scene au Canada, Special Issue 3, no. 8A (1966). "Rideau Vert: Quality and Permanence." The Stage in Canada 5, no. 9 (1970): 4-10. *Doucette, Leonard. Theatre in French-Canada Laying the Kundations 1606-1867. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1984. *Edwards, Murray. A Stage in Our Past: English-language Theatre in Eastern Canada from the 1790s to 1914. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1968. Germain, Jean-Claude. "A Trying Centre for Drama." The Stage in Canada 5, no. 1 (1969): 8-12. "Theatre Quebecois or Theatre Protestant?" Canadian Theatre Review 11 (Summer, 1976): 8-22.

139


Graham, Franklin. Histrionic Montreal, Montreal: John Lovell and Son, 1902. Hamblet, Edwin G. Marcel Dube and French-Canadian Drama. New York: Exposition Press, 1970. Hare, John, and Hathorn, Ramon. "Sarah Bemhart's Visits to Canada: Dates and Repertory." Histoire du theatre au Canada/Theatre History in Canada 2, no. 2 (Fall, 1981): 93-116. Kapica, Jack. "Jeanine Beaubien sits on a multicultural powder keg." Performing Arts in Canada 11, no. 3 (1974): 25-6. Lee, Betty. Love and Whiskey. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1973. Lucas, Sir Charles, ed. Lord Durham's Report on the Affairs of British North America. New York: Augustus M. McKelly, 1970. McCaEum, Heather. Theatre Resources in Canadian Collections, Ottawa: National Library of Canada, 1973. Moy, James S. "The Opening of Montreal's Theatre Royal, 1825." Histoire du theatre au Canada/Theatre History in Canada 1, no. 1 (Spring, 1980): 24-38. Myers, Hugh B. The Quebec Revolution. Montreal: Harvest House, 1964. Nardocchio, Elaine F. "Church and State, Religion and Politics in Quebec Theatre." Bulletin of Canadian Studies 7, no. 2 (Winter, 1983/84): 73-80. ."The Individual and the Community in Quebec Theatre of the 1970s." Regionalism and National Identity: MuhMscytinary Essays in Canada, Australia and New Zealand. 1984 Proceedings, Australian and New Zealand Association of Canadian Studies. Christ Church: ACSANZ, 1985. "Interview with Gratien Gelinas," July 10, 1972, unpublished. "1958-1968: Ten Formative Years in Quebec's Theatre History." Canadian DramalL'Art Dramatique Canadien 12, no. 1 (Spring 1986):: 1-24. Ouellet, Fernand. Lower Canada 1791-1840. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1980. Ricard, Michel. "L'Estoc: A Matter of Mere Survival," The Stage in Canada, Vol. 3, no. 1 (1968): 6-9. *Rickett, Olla Goewey. The French-Speaking Theatre of Montreal, 1937-1963. Ann Arbor: University Microfilms, 1964. Rioux, Marcel and Martin, Yves, ed. French-Canadian Society, Vol. 1. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1971. Trans. Marcel Rioux and Yves Martin. La Societe candienne francaise. Montreal: HMH, 1971. Rubin, Don, ed. Canada on Stage, Canadian Theatre Review Yearbook, 1974. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1975. Canada on Stage, 1975. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1976. Canada on Stage, 1976. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1977. Canada on Stage, 1977. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1978. Canada on Stage, 1978. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1979. Canada on Stage, 1978. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1979. Canada on Stage, 1979. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1980. Canada on Stage, 1980-81. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1981. Canada on Stage, 1981-82. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1982. Rubin, Don, and Crammer-Byng, Allison, eds. Canada's Playwrights. A Biographical Guide. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1981. Ryan, Toby Gordon. Stage Left, Canadian Theatre in the Thirties, A Memoir. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1981. 140

Bibliography Shek, Ben, "Les Oranges sont vertes." Performing Arts in Canada 9, no. 3 (Fall, 1972): 44-5. "Quebec's New Playwrights Go Natural with a Little Bit of Help from C.E.A.D." Performing Arts in Canada 11, no. 2 (Summer, 1974): 19-20. "En frangais, Le Grand cirque ordinarie," Performing Arts in Canada 10, no. 4 (Winter, 1973): 16-19. Smith, Donald. "The Anatomy of a Touring Company." The Stage in Canada 4, no. 8 (1968): 8-13. Stratford, Philip. Biblbgraphy of Canadian Books in Translation: French to English and English to French, 2nd ed. Ottawa: Humanities Research Council of Canada, 1977. Toye, William, ed. Supplement to the Oxford Oompardon to Canadian History and Literature. Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1973. The Oxford Companion to Canadian Literature. Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1983. Usmiani, Renate. "Andre Brassard: Discovering the Nuances." Canadian Theatre Review, no. 24 (Fall, 1979): 38-41. ."The Tremblay Opus: Unity in Diversity." Canadian Theatre Review, no. 24 (Fall, 1979): 12-25.

Gratien GeHnas. Profiles in Canadian Drama. Toronto: Gage, 1980. "The Musical Comedies of Michel Tremblay: A Lighter Side of Alienation and Identity Crisis." Canadian Drama/LArt dramatique canadien 6, no. 2 (Fall, 1980): 192-200.

.Michel Tremblay. Vancouver: Douglas and Mdntyre, 1981. * Second Stage: The Alternative Theatre Movement in Canada. Vancouver: The University of British Columbia Press, 1983. Vanstone, Valerie. "Popular Theatre as an Expression of Community." M.A. thesis, Universite de Sherbrooke, 1980. Wade, Masson. "The Legacy of Conquest: 1760-1792." In The French Canadians: 1760-1967, Vol. I. Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1968. The French Canadians: 1760-1967. Vol. 1. Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1968. Wagner, Anton. Canada's Lost Plays. Vol. 4 of Cobnial Quebec; French-Canadian Drama, 1606-1966. Toronto: Canadian Theatre Review Publications, 1982. FRENCH-CANADIAN PLAYS CITED

Barbeau, Jean. Ben-Ur, Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1971. .Le Chemin de Lacroix, followed by Gogh. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1971. Manon Lastcall et /oualez-moi d'amour. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, Coll. Theatre canadien, 1972. Citrouttte. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1974. ,Une Brosse. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1975. La Coupe Stainless, followed by Solange. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1974. .In collaboration with Marcel Dube, Dites-k avec desfkurs. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1976.

141


Barrette, Jacqueline. Ca-dit-qu'essa-a-dire. Montreal: Grandes Editions du Quebec, 1972. Flatte ta bedaine Ephreme. Montreal: Grandes editions du Quebec, 1973. Blais, Maire-Claire. L'Execution. Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1968. Boucher, Denise. Les Fees ont soif. Montreal: Editions Intermede, 1978. Bourget, Elizabeth. Bemadette et Juliette ou la vie c'est comme la vaisselle, c'est toujours a recommencer. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1979. Brassard, Andre, with Tremblay, Michel. Lysistrata, Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1969. Carrier, Roch. La Guerre, Yes Sir! Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1970. Fbralie, ou es-tu? Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1974. .// n'y a pas de pays sans grand-pere. Montreal: A. Stanke, 1977. Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques. L'Immaculee Creation. Mimeographed. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1973. Choquette, Robert. Le Cure de village: scenes de vie canadiennes. Montreal: Editions Granger, 1936. Dagenais, Rene. IsabeBe. Montreal: Editions P. Dagenais, 1961. Derome, Gilles. Qui est Dupressin? Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1972. La Maison des oiseaux, Montreal: Lemeac. 1973. Deyglun, Henri. Coeur de maman. Montreal: Editions le Theatre populaire frangais, 1936. Dube, Marcel. Au retour des oies blanches. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1969. Les Beaux Dimanches. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1968. BOan. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1968. Florence. Quebec: Institut litteraire, 1960. Reprint. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1970.

Un Matin comme ks autres, Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1971. Pauvre Amour. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1969. Un Simple Sdldat, in Le Temps des Was. Quebec: Institut litteraire, 1958. Reprint. Montreal: Editions de THornine, 1967. Le Temps des Was. Quebec: Institut litteraire, 1958. Reprint. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1969. Zone, Montreal: Editions de la Cascade, 1956. Reprint. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1968. Ducharme, Rejean. Ines Peree et Inat Tendu, Montreal: Lemeac and Parti Pris, 1976. Ha, Ha! St. Laurent: Editions Lacombe, 1982. Dufresne, Guy. Le Cri de I'engoulevent. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1969. Docile. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1972. Les Traitants. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1969. Dumas, Roger, Les Comediens, Theatre vivant, no. 7. Montreal: Holt, Rinehart, Winston, 1969. LesMWonnaires, Theatre vivant, no. 2. Montreal: Holt, Rinehart, Winston, 1967. Duschesne, Jacques, Le Quadrille. Montreal: Editions Lemeac. 1975. Dussault, Louisette. Moman. Montreal: Editions du Boreal Express, 1981. Perron, Jacques. Les Grands Sotefls. Montreal: Editions d'Orphee, 1956. Frechette, Louis-Honore. Felix Poutre. Montreal: n.p., 1871. Papineau. Montreal: Chapleau et Lavigne, 1880. Le Ketour de 1'exile. Montreal: Chapleau et Lavigne, 1880.

142

Bibliography Garneau, Michel. Abries desabries, followed by L'Usage du coeur dans le domaine red. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1979. .Les Celebrations, followed by Adidou Adidouce. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1977. .Quatre a quatre, Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1979. .Strauss et Pesant (et Rosa). Montreal: Editions de 1'Aurore, 1974. Gauvreau, Claude. La Charge de I'original epormyabk, Les Oranges sont vertes. In Oeuvres completes, pp. 637-754, 1363-1488. Montreal: Parti Pris, 1971. Gelinas, Gratien. Bousille et les justes. Quebec: Institut litteraire du Quebec, 1960. Reprint. Montreal: Editions de I'Homme, 1967. Hier les enfants dansaknt. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1968. Tii-coq. Montreal: Editions Beauchemin, 1950. Gelinas, Marc F. Qu'on I'ecoute, Theatre vivant, no. 3 (1967). Gerin-Lajoie, Antoine. Le Jeune Latour, in L'Aurore des Canadas, September 7, and 12, 1844. Le Canadkn, September 16, 18, and 20, 1844. Also, Le Jeune Latour. Montreal: Reedition-Ouebec, 1969. Germain, Jean-Claude. A Canadian Play/Une plaie canadienne. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1983. Digwdi, Diguidi, Ha! Ha! Ha! followed by Si les Sansoucis s'en soucient, ces Sancoucis-d s'en soucieront-ils? Bien parkr c'est se respecter. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1972. .L'Ecok des reves. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1979. .Les Faux Brillants de Felix-Gabriel Marchard. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1977. .Les Hants et les bos de la vie d'une diva; Sarah Menard par eux-memes. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1976. Les Nuits de I'indwa/une mascapade. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1983. .Le Roi des mises a bas prix. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1972. .Un Keys dont la devise estje m'oublie. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1976. Les Tburtereaux, ou La Viellessefrappe a I'aube, Montreal: Editions de TAurore, 1974. Grandmont, Eloi de. Un Fits a tuer. Montreal: Editions de Malte, 1950. .La Fbntaine de Paris. Montreal: Editions de Malte, 1955. Guilbeault, Luce, et. al. La Nef des Sorckres. Montreal: Quinze, 1976. Gurik, Robert. A coeur ouvert, Montreal: Editions Lemeac. 1969. .Apt 2967, suivi de La Palissade. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1979. .Hamlet, Prince du Quebec. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1977. Le Pendu. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1970. .Le Proces de Jean-Baptiste M. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1972. Gurik, Robert and Morin, Jean. Alb . . . Police. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1974. Guyon, Louis. Denis le patriote. Montreal: n.p., 1902. .Montferrand. Montreal: n.p., 1903. Montcabn. Montreal: n.p., 1907. Hebert, Anne. Le Temps sauvage. In Ecrits du Canada-francais. Vol. 16, pp. 9-108. 1963.

Huard, Roger. Pile. Montreal: Editions de 1'Arc, 1964. Laberge, Marie. "Profession: je 1'aime." ("On a ben fail s'comprendre," "T'sais veux dire," "Profession: je 1'aime," "Eva et Evelyne"). Mimeographed. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1978. C'etait avant la guerre a I'Anse a Gilles. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1981. 143

THEATRE AND POLITICS IN MODERN QUfiBEC

Lamarche, Gustave. La Defaite de I'enfer. Montreal: Libraire Saint-Viateur, 1938. .Jonathas. Montreal: Libraire des Clercs de Saint-Viateur, 193S. Notre-Dame de la Cowonne. Joliette: Editions des Paraboliers du Roi, 1947. Langevin, Andre. L'Oeil du peupk. Montreal: Cercle du Livre de France, 1958. Languirand, Jacques. Les Grands Departs. Montreal: Cercle du Livre de France, 1958. Le Gibet. Montreal: tercle du Liwe de France, 1960. Les Insotites, et Les Vbbns de 1'automne. Montreal: Cercle du Livre de France, 1962. Kbndyke. Montreal: Cercle du Liwe de France, 1970. Laurendeau, Andre. Deux Femmes terribks. In Theatre. Montreal: HMH, 1970. Leclerc, Felix. Le P'tit Bonheur, Sornnez les matines. Montreal: Editions Beauchemin, 1959. L'Auberge des morts subites. Montreal: Editions Beauchemin, 1964. Leliewe, Yvon. "Humour noir sur un satyre Jeeeesus." Mimeographed. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1970. Lepage, Roland. La Complainte des hivers rouges. Montreal: Editions Lemeac. 1974. Le Temps d'une vie. Montreal: Editions Lemeac. 1974. Lescarbot, Marc. Le Theatre de Neptune en la Nouvelle-France, in Les Muses de la Nouvelle-France. Paris: Chez Jean Millet, 1609. Also in Ecrits du Canada francais, Vol. 18, pp. 267-295. 1964. Loranger, Francpise. Double jeu. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1969. Encore cinq minutes, followed by Un cri qid vient de bin. Montreal: Cercle du Livre de France, 1967. Un Maison . . . unjour. . . . Montreal: Cercle du Liwe de France, 1965. Medium saignant. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1970. Loranger, Francpise, and Claude Levac. Le Chemin du roy. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1969. Maillet, Antonine. EvangeKne Deusse, Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1975. Gapi. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1976. La Sagouine. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1971, 1974. Marchand, Felix-Gabriel. Un Bonheur en attire un autre. Montreal: Imprimerie de la Gazette, 1883. .Les Faux brillants. Montreal: Prendergast et cie., 1885. Mercier, Serge. Encore un peu. Montreal: Editions de l'Aurore, 1974, out of print. Mimeographed. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1974. Moreau, Francois. Les Taupes. In Ecrits du Canada frangais. Vol. 6, pp. 9-90. 1960. Morin, Jean. Vive I'empereur, Theatre vtvant, no. 1 (1966). Petitdair, Pierre. La Donation, in L'Artisan 1, no 20 (December 15, 1842); no. 21 (December 19, 1842); no. 22 (December 22, 1842); no. 23 (December 26, 1842); no. 24 (December 29, 1842). .Une Partie de campagne. Quebec: Joseph Savard, 1865. Petijean, Leon and Rollin, Henri. Aurore, I'enfant Martyre. Montreal: V.L.B. editeur, 1982. Quesnel, Joseph. LAngbmarde. Le Canada frangais 20, nos, 4, 5, et 6 (1932-1933): 341-350, 448-60, 549-57. Colas et Colinette, ou le baflti dupe. Quebec: John Neilson, 1808.

144

Bibliography .Les RepubHcains franfais. La Barre du/our, no. 25 (1970): 64-88. Ricard, Andre. La vie exsmplaire d'Akide kr k pharammwc et sa proche descendance. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1973. Roy, Louise and Saia, Louis. "Une Amie d'enfance." Mimeographed. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1978. "Ida Lachance." Mimeographed. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1978. Sauveageau, Yves. Wouf, Wouf Montreal: Editions Lemeac. 1970. Savard, Felix-Antoine. La Dalk-des-morts. Montreal: Fides, 1965. Sirois, Serge. Aujourd'hid peut-etre. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1974. Dodo, I'enfant do. Mimeographed. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1974. Toupin, Paul. Theatre (Brutus, Le Mensonge, Chacun son amour), Montreal: Cercle du Liwe de France, 1961. Brutus. Montreal: n.p. 1952. Tremblay, Michel. A tot, pour toujours, ta Mark-Lou. Montreal: Editions Lemeac. 1971. Les BeVes-Soeurs. Theatre vivant, no. 6 (1968). Les Belks-Soeurs, Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1972. .Bonjour, la, bonjour, Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1974. Damme Manon, Sacree Sandra, Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1977. Eh pkces detachees, followed by La Duchesse de Langeais, Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1970. Demain matin, Montreal m 'attend. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1973. .L'Effet des rayons gamma sur ks vkux garcons. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1970.

. , Et Mile Roberge boit un peu. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1971. Hosanna followed by La Duchesse de Langeais. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1973. .L'Impromptu d'Outremont. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1980. Lysistrata. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1969. .Sainte Carmen de la Main. Montreal: Editions Lemeac, 1976. Trois Pstits Tours. Montreal: Editions Lemeac. 1971.

FRENCH-CANADIAN PLAYS IN

TRANSLATDN

Barbeau, Jean. Le Chemin de Lacroix. Montreal: Lemeac, 1971. Trans. Laurence R. Berard and Philip W. London. The Way of Lacrosse, Toronto: Pbywrights Co-op, 1972. Manon LastcaU et Jovakz-moi d'amour. Montreal: Lemeac, 1972. Trans. Philip W. London and Susan K. London. Manon LastcaU. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1973. Solange, Goglu, Montreal: Lemeac. Trans. John Van Burek. Solange, Gogh. Canadian Theatre Review 11 (Summer, 1976): 92-117. Blais, Marie-Claire. L'Exscution. Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1966. Trans. David Lobdell. The Execution. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1976. 145


Carrier, Roch. La Guerre, Yes Sir! Montreal: Editions du Jour. Trans. Sheila Fischman. La Guerre, Yes Sir! Toronto: Anansi, 1970. FbraKe, ou es-tu? Montreal: Editions du Jour, 1969. Trans. Sheila Fischman. FbraKe, Where Are You? Toronto: Anansi, 1971. Il n'y a pas de pays sans grand-pere, Montreal: A Starke, 1977. Trans. 1977. Items. Sheila Fischman. No Country Without Grandfathers. Toronto: Anansi, 1981. Dube, Marcel. Au retour des oies blanches, Montreal: Lemeac, 1969. Trans. Jean Remple. The White Geese. Toronto: New Press, 1972. Dufresne, Guy. Le Cri de I'engoidevenf. Montreal: Lemeac, 1969. Trans. Philip W. London and Laurence R. Berard. The Call of the Whippoorwill. Toronto: New Press, 1972. Frechette, Louis-Honore. Papineau. Montreal: Chapieau et Lavigne, 1880. Trans. Eugene Benson and Renate Benson. Papineau, in Anton Wagner, ed., Canada's Lost Plays. Vol. 4, pp. 141-202, Cobnial Quebec: French-Canadian Drama, 1606-1966, Toronto: CTR Publications, 1982. Gameau, Michel. Quatre a Quatre. Montreal: Editions 1'Aurore, 1974. Trans. Christian Bedard and Keith Tumbull. four to four in Rolf Halman, ed., A Collection of Canadian Plays, Vol. 5, pp. A1-A47, Toronto: Simon and Pierre, 1978. Gelinas, Gratien. Bousie et les justes. Montreal: Editions de I'Momme, 1960. Trans. Kenneth Johnston and Joflfre Miville-Dechene. Bousille and the just. Toronto: Clarke, Irwin, 1961. Hier les enfants dansaient, Montreal: Lemeac, 1968. Trans. Mavor Moore. Yesterday the Children were Dancing. Toronto: Clarke, Irwin, 1967. Also in Anton Wagner, ed., Canada's Lost Plays, Vol. 4, pp. 270-323, Colonial Quebec: French-Canadian Drama, 1606-1966, Toronto: CTR Publications, 1982. ,Tit-coq. Montreal: Beauchemin, 1950. Trans, Kenneth Johnson and Gratien Gelinas. Tit-Coq. Toronto: Clarke, Irwin, 1967. Gerin-Lajoie, Antoine. Le Jeune Latour in L'Aurore des Canadas, September 7, and 12, 1844, and September 16, 18, and 20, 1844. Also, Le Jeme Latour, Montreal: Reedition-Quebec, 1969. Trans. Louise Forsyth, The Young Latour in Anton Wagner, ed., Canada's Lost Plays, Vol. 4, pp. 111-140, Colonial Quebec: French-Canadian Drama, 1606-1966, Toronto: CTR Publications, 1982. Gurik, Robert. 1967 et La Palissade, Montreal: Lemeac, 1971. Trans. Marc F. Gelinas. API 2967. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1974. .Le Pendu. Montreal: Lemeac, 1970. Trans. Philip W, London and Laurence R. Berard. The Hanged Man. Toronto: New Press, 1972. .Les Champions. Montreal: Lemeac, 1977. Trans. Allan van Meer. The Champion. Toronto: Playwrights Canada, 1981. __Le _.Le Proces de Jean-Baptists M. Montreal: Lemeac, 1972. Trans. Allan Van Meer. The Trial of Jean-Baptiste M. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1974. .Hamlet, Prince du Quebec. Montreal: Lemeac, 1970. Trans. Marc F, Gelinas. Hamlet, Prince of Quebec. Toronto: Playwrights Canada, 1981. Lavigne, Louis-Dominique. As-tu peur des voleursl Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1978. Trans. Henry Beissel. Are You Afraid of Thieves? in Rolf Kalman, ed. A Collection of Canadian Plays, Vol. 5, pp. F41-F47, Toronto: Simon and Pierre, 1978. 146

Bibliography Lepage, Roland. Le Temps d'une vie. Montreal: Lemeac, 1978. "tons. Sheila Fishman. In a Lifetime. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1978. Lescarbot, Marc. Le Theatre de Neptune en fa Nouvelle France, Represente sur les flots du Port Royal le quartorzieme de novembre mille six cents six. In his Histoire de fa Nouvelle France, Paris, 1609. Trans. Harriet Taber Richardson. The Theatre of Neptune in New France. Presented upon the Waves of Port Royal the Fourteenth Day of November, Sixteen Hundred and Six, on the Return of the Sieur de Poutrincourt from the Armoucrdquois Country, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1927. Also, trans. Eugene Benson and Renate Benson. The Theatre of Neptune in New France, in Anton Wagner, ed., Canada's Lost Plays, Vol. 4, pp. 35-44. Cobnial Quebec: French-Canadfan Drama, 1606-1966, Toronto: CTR Publications, 1982. Maillet, Antonine. La Sagouine, Montreal: Les Editions Marquis, 1979. Trans. Luis de Cespedes. La Sagouine. Toronto: Simon and Pierre, 1979. McDonough, John Thomas. Charbonneau and le Chef. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1968. Trans. Paul Hebert and Paul Morency. Charbonneau et k chef. Montreal: Lemeac, 1974. Mercier, Serge. Encore un pen. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1978. Trans. Allan Van Meer, Rolf Kalman, ed., in A Collection of Canadian Plays, Vol. 5, pp. C19-C48, Toronto: Simon and Pierre, 1978. Pasquale, Dominique de. On n'est pas sorti du bois. Trans. Allan Van Meer. We Ain't Out of the Woods Yet. Mimeographed. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, n.d. Quesnel, Louis Joseph. Colas et CoKnette, ou le baUK dupe: comedie-vaudeville. Libretto. Quebec: John Neilson, 1808. Trans. Michel S. Lecavalier and Godfrey Ridout, Cofas et CoKnette, or the bailiff confounded: comic opera. Toronto: Gordon V. Thompson Ltd., 1974. Also in Anton Wagner, ed., Canada's Lost Plays, Vol. 4, pp. 53-95, Cobnial Quebec: French-Canadfan Drama, 1606-1966, Toronto: CTR Publications, 1982. Les republicans franc, ais, in La Barre du Jour, no. 25 (1970): 64-88. Trans. Louise Forsyth, The French Republicans or An Evening in the Tavern, in Anton Wagner, ed., Canada's Lost Plays, Vol 4, pp. 96-110, Cobnial Quebec: French-Canadfan Drama, 1606-1966. Toronto: CTR Publications, 1982. Roussin, Claude. Une Job. Montreal: Editions L'Aurore, 1975. Trans. Allan Van Meer. Looking for a Job, in Rolf Kalman, ed., A Collection of Canadian Plays, Vol. 5. pp. E1-E32, Toronto: Simon and Pierre, 1978. Simard, Andre. En Attendant Gaudreault. Montreal: Lemeac, 1976. Trans. Henry Beissel, Arlette Franciere, Waiting for Gaudreault, in Rolf Kalman ed., A Collection of Canadfan Plays, Vol. 5. pp. C1-C16, Toronto: Simon and Pierre, 1978. Sirois, Serge. Dodo I'enfant do. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1978. Trans. John Van Burek. Dodo, in Rolf Kalman, ed., A Collection of Canadfan Plays, Vol. 5, pp. D1-D32, Toronto: Simon and Pierre, 1978. Tremblay, Michel. En pieces detachees. Montreal: Lemeac, 1970. Trans. Allan Van Meer. En pieces detachees. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1975. Also trans. Allan Van Meer. Like Death Warmed Over. Toronto: Playwrights Co-op, 1973.

147

THEATRE AND POIJTICS IN MODERN QUEBEC

Hosanna, followed by La Duchesse de Langeais, Montreal: Lemeac, 1973. Trans. Bill Glassco and John Van Burek. Hosanna. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1974. Les Belks-Soeurs. Montreal: Holt, Rinehart et Winston, 1968. Reprint. Montreal: Lemeac, 1973. Trans. John Van Burek and Bill Glassco. Les BeOesSoeurs. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1974. Trois Pettis Tours. Montreal: Lemeac, 1971. Trans. John Van Burek. La Duchesse de Langeais and other plays. Gloria Star, Berths, Johnny Morgana and His Astonishing Dogs. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1976. A toi, pour toujours, ta Marie-Lou. Montreal: Lemeac, 1971. Trans. John Van Burek and Bill Glassco. Fbrever Yours, Marie-Lou. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1975. Bonjour, &, bonjour, Montreal: Lemeac, 1974. Trans. John Van Burek and Bill Glassco. Bonjour, la, bonjour. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1975. La Duchesse de Langeais, in Hosanna followed by La Duchesse de Langeais. Montreal: Lemeac, 1973. Trans. John Van Burek. La Duchesse de Langeais and Other Plays. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1976. .Damnee Manon, Sacree Saudra. Montreal: Lemeac, 1977. Trans. John Van Burek. La Duchesse de Langeais and Other Plays. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1976. .Surprise! Surprise! Montreal: Lemeac, 1977. Trans. John Van Burek. Surprise! Surprise! in La Duchesse de Langeais and Other Plays. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1976. .Sainte Carmen de la Main. Montreal: Lemeac, 1976. Trans. John Van Burke. Sainte Carmen of the Main. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1978. Les Socles. Canadian Theatre Review 24 (Fall, 1979): 57-60. Trans. Renate Usmiani. The Pedestals, Canadian Theatre Review 24 (Fall, 1979): 52-56. Tremblay, Renald. La Celeste Greta. Montreal: Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques, 1978. Trans. Allan Van Meer. Greta, The Divine, in Rolf Kalman, ed., A Collection of Canadian Plays, Vol. 5, pp. B1-B31, Toronto: Simon and Pierre, 1978.

148

Index

This index of people, places, and plays does not contain the English titles of any of the French plays cited. Play characters are not listed. Academic de Musique, 9-10, 12, 14 A Canadian Play/Une plaie canadienne, 107-8 A Coeur ouvert, 60-62 ACTA. See L'Association canadienne du theatre d'amateur Adidou, Adidouce, 91-92 Adrienne Lecouvrew, 10 Albani, See Lajeunesse, Emma Albee, Edward, 26 Alice au pays de sommeil, 84 Allo... Mice!, 60, 62 Altitude 3,200, 23 A ma mere, a ma mere, a ma mere, a ma voisine, 99 Amateur Actor's Festival, 15 Amourette, 54 Ancrenat, Anne, 88 Anjou, 32 Anouilh, Jean, 23 Apt'2967, 60-62 Arcade, Montreal, 16 Archambault, Joseph S. (Palmieri), 9 Aristophanes, 67 Arrabal, Fernando, 88 Artaud, Antonin, 38, 55 Atelier continu, Montreal, 101 Athalie, 27 A tot, pour toupurs, ta Marie-Lou, 67, 70, 72-73, 92

Audiberti, Jacques, 26 Aujourd'hui peut-etre, 91 Au retow des oies blanches, 43-44 Aurore, I'enfant martyr, 17 Auxyeux des hommes, 79 Avignon Summer Festival, 80 Avon Theatre, Stratford, 96 Baillargeon, Louis, 85 Baillargeon, Paule, 84-86, 98 Barbeau, Jean, 53, 78, 80, 97, 101-6, 117 Barjon, Father Louis, 22 Barrette, Jacqueline, 98 Barry, Fred, 17, 30, 34 Bastien, Jean-Luc, 83

Baty, Gaston, 22 Beaubien, Jeanine, 27 Beaulne, Guy, 28, 51 Beaulne, Martine, 86 Beaumarchais, Pierre Augustine, 6, 8 Beckett, Thomas, 26, 28, 38, 55 Bedard, Lyse, 85 Bedard, Marie, 84 Ben-Ur, 101-3 Beraud, Jean, 29 Berd, Franchise, 28 Bemadette et Juliette ou ta Vie c'est comme la vaisselle c'est toupurs d recommencer, 100 Bemhardt, Sarah, 9-10, 110 Berube, Jocelyn, 84, 85 Bilan, 41, 44 Bill 101, 77 Bill 63, 65, 103 Bingo or 0-71, 78, 102 Blackburn, Marthe, 99 Blais, Marie-Claire, 55, 99 Bloc Fbpulaire, 21 Boisjoli, Charlotte, 23-24 Bolduc, Lyse, 87 Bonjour, la, bonjour, 67, 72 Booth, John Wilkes, 9 Bourduas, Paul-Emile, 22 Bouchard, Raymond, 78, 79 Boucher, Denise, 99-100 Bourget, Elizabeth, 100 Bousille et lesjustes, 32, 35-36 Brassard, Andre, 67-68 Brecht, Bertolt, 26, 38 Brind'Amour, Yvette, 23, 26, 27 Brossard, Nicole, 99 Brutus, 24, 32 Buissonneau, Paul, 52, 64 Ca dit qu'essa & dire, 98 Cafe de la Place, Montreal, 79 Cafe Nelligan, Montreal, 79 Cafe Rimbaud, Quebec, 79 Caillon, Andre, 79

149


Caligula, 26 Camus, Albert, 26 Canada Council, 28, 86 Canadian Amateur Theatre Association, 28 Canadian Centre of the International Theatre Institute, 80 Canadiens, 10, 12 Carnac-Marquis, Normand, 86 Carrier, Louis-Georges, 26, 32 Carrier, Roch, 96, 97 Carrier, Francois, 27 Cazelais, Clement, 87 Cazeneuve, Paul, 15 CBC Radio. See Radio-Canada Celk qui la portefit s'ouvrir, 22 Cent-Associes, 4 Centre d'essai des auteurs dramatiques (CEAD), Montreal, 52-54, 60, 80, 95 Centre d'essai le Conventum, Quebec, 78, 94, 100 Centre d'essai, University of Montreal, 91 Centre du Theatre d'Aujourd hui (CTA), Montreal, 108-11 Centre du theatre quebecois, 80 Ce qu'iifaut savoir, 53 Cades, 14-15 Chalmer's Award, 95 Chambre a louer, 41 Chancerel, Leon Louis, 23 Chansonmrs, 31 Chanteclerc, Montreal, 16. See also Stella Charbonneau, Archbishop Joseph, 21, 78 Charbonneau et le chef, 21-22, 78 Charest, Marie-Renee, 87 Chateau St-Louis, 4 Chekhov, Anton Pavlovich, 45, 52 Chenier, Jean-Olivier, 107 Cheval defer, 79 Chevalier, Diane, 86 Choquette, Robert, 17, 29, 30 Cinema Outrement, Montreal, 86 Cinq, 67 Citadel Theatre, Edmonton, 70, 101 Citrouille, 97-98, 105-6 Claudel, Paul, 23, 25, 83 Cloutier, Raymond, 84 Cocteau, Jean, 23 Coeur de Maman, 16 Colas et Colinette ou k bailli dupe, 7, 13 College de Montreal, 29 150

College de Nicolet, 8, 12 College d'Enseignement General et Professionel (CEGEP), 49, 56, 79 College Ste-Marie, 8 College St-Laurent, 22 College St-Raphael, 6 Comedie-Canadienne, 28, 32, 34-37, 41, 43-44, 59, 63, 65 Compagnie du Masque, 24-25 Compagnie Jean Duceppe, 63, 67 Concours d'oeuvres theatrales (TNM), 32 Conservatoire d'art dramatique du Quebec, 28, 51, 54, 86 Conservatoire Lassalle, 15-16 Cooperative du Grand Cirque Ordinaire, 85-86 Copeau, Jacques, 22 Corneille, Pierre, 4, 8, 26, 52 Cousin, Gabriel, 51 Coutu, Jean, 23 Creation Collective I, 87 Crete, Jacques, 87-88 Cross, James, 77 Cultural Affairs, Ministry of, 50-52, 82, 85

Curzie, Pierre, 85 Cyr, Louis, 109 Dagenais, Pierre, 17, 23-24 Damnee Manon, Sacree Sandra, 67, 73, 105 Daoust, Julien, 15 Dauriac, Gaston, 17 De Bergerac, Cyrano, 109 De Champlain, Samuel, 3 De Gaulle, General Charles, 50 De Grandmont, Eloi, 24, 31-32 De la Sablonniere, Blanche, 9 Demain matin Montreal m 'attend, 67, 71-72

De Mareuil, Jacques, 4-5 Denis le Patriote, 16 De Poutrincourt, Jean, 3 Derome, Giles, 53-54 De St-Vallier, Monseigneur Jean Baptiste, 4-5 Desbiens, Jean-Paul, 49 Descarrie, Alfred, 15 Desperrier, Helene, 86 Desprez, Jean, 17, 24, 27 Desrivieres, Rodolphe, 11

Index Desrouchers, Marie-France, 87 D'Este, Mimi, 17 Deux Femm.es terribks, 54 De Vaudreuil, P., 6 Deyglun, Henri, 16-17 Dickens, Charles, 9 Diguidi, Diguidi, Ha! Ha! Ha!, 83 Doat, Jan, 26-28 Docile, 59 Dominion Drama Festival, 28, 37, 41, 52-54, 60, 89 Dore, Fernand, 24 Dore, Marc, 87 Dostoyevski, Fedor Mikhailovich, 28, 52 Double jeu, 63-65 Dow Breweries, 28 Drapeau, Jean, 21, 28, 33 Dube, Marcel, 25, 30-31, 41-45, 59, 73, 116-17 Duceppe, Jean, 23, 26, 78 Ducharme, Rejean, 55-56 Duchesne, Jacques, 53-54 Duchesse de Langeais, 105 Ducreux, Louis, 27 Dufour, Yvon, 26 Dufresne, Guy, 58-59 Du Card, Martin, 23 Dullin, Charles, 22 Dulongpre, Louis, 6-7 Dumas, Roger, 53-54 Duplessis, Maurice (Le Chef), 21-22, 31, 33-34, 40, 49, 78 Duquesne, Albert, 17 Durand, Pierre, 17 Duras, Marguerite, 51 Durham, Lord, (Lambton, John), 108 Diirrenmatt, Friedrich, 26 Dussault, Louisette, 83, 100-101 Earl Grey Musical and Dramatic Competition, 15. See also Dominion Drama Festival Ecole Nationale de Theatre (ENT), 84, 86 Egregore, Montreal, 60 Eleonor, 55 Emile et we mat, 105-6 Encore cinq minutes, 63-64 Encore un pen, 80, 95-96 En/ants, 107 En Pieces Detachees, 67-69 Equation pour un homme actuel, 51-52

Et Caetera, 101 Ete et fiance, 28 Et Mile Roberge boit un peu, 67 Euripides, 83 Expo '67, 51 Ex-tasse, Montreal, 79 Fabbri, Jacques, 26 Fabre, Monseigneur Edouard-Charles, 10 Faby en Afrique, 78 Fando et Us, 80 Faucher, Frangoise, 26 Faucher, Jean, 27 Favreau, Marc, 26 Felix Poutre, 12 Perron, Jacques, 55-57, 116 Festival of Children's Theatre, 79 Feydeau, Georges, 25 Filion, J.P,, 9 Fin de partie, 28 Flatte la bedaine, Ephreme, 98 Florence, 42 Forget, Florent, 23 Foucher, Antoine, 6 Francoeur, Louis, 29 Frangoise Durocher, waitress, 68 Frechette, Louis, 10, 12 Fred Barry-Albert Duquesne Acting Company, 17 Fregault, Guy, 50-51 Frisch, Max, 26 Front de Liberation du Quebec (FLQ), 36-37, 50, 77 Frontenac, Louis de Buade, 4 Gadouas, Robert, 25 Gagnon, Dominique, 99 Gagnon, Odette, 83, 99 Gaiete, Montreal, 28 Galipeau, }., 26 Garceau, Roger, 23 Garceau, Suzanne, 84-86, 98 Garneau, Franoois-Xavier, 12 Garneau, Michel, 53, 80, 91-92, 97, 117 Gascon, Jean, 23-25 Gatti, Armand, 51 Gaudreault, Jean-Yves, 80 Gauvreau competition of 1929, 16 Gauvreau, Georges, 15 Gelinas, Gratien, 17, 28-30, 32-37, 41, 116 Genet, Jean, 51

151


George, John, Earl of Durham, 11 Georges! Oh Georges, 63 Gerin-Lajoie, Antoine, 12 Germain, Jean-Claude, 80, 82-84, 107-11, 116-17 Gerry! Oh! Gerry!, 98 Gesii Montreal, 23, 26-27, 31, 34, 37 Gheon, Henri, 23 Girard, Benoit, 27 Giroux, Antoinette, 17 Godin, Guy, 26 Goglu, 101, 105-6 Goldsmith, Oliver, 9 Governor-General's Award, 38-91 Graton, Frangoise, 52 Gravel, Robert, 88 Grey, Lord Albert, 15 Grignon, Claude-Henri, 17 Groulx, Andre, 30 Groulx, Georges, 23, 25-26, 52 Guilbeault, Luce, 86, 98-99 Guimond, Ernest, 16 Gurik, Robert, 52, 59-62, 80, 116 Gury, Paul, 27 Guyon, Louis, 15-16 Hading, Jean, 9 Ha! Ha!, 56 Haldimand, Frederick, 7 Hamlet, Prince du Quebec, 60-61 Hayes Theatre, Montreal, 9 Haymarket Theatre, Quebec, 8 Hebert, Anne, 30, 55, 57-58 Hebert, Marie-Francine, 80 Hebert, Paul, 78 Herbert, John, 79 Her Majesty's Theatre, 9 Hier ks en/ants dansaierti, 36 Histoire da Canada, 12 Hobbit, Quebec, 91 Hoffman, Guy, 23, 25 Hosanna, 67, 71-72 Houle, Leopold, 24 Huard, Roger, 53, 55 Huis Cbs, 23

Ida Lachance, 94 // etait unefois dans Vest, 68 Ilfaut que fa change, 49 // n'y a pas de pays sansgrand-pere, 96-97 Ines Peree et Inat Tendu, 55 152

International Arts Festival, 25 International Festival of Children's Theatre, The First, 80 International Theatre Institute, 80 International Youth Theatre, 51 lonesco, Eugene, 26, 55 Isabella, Therese, 88 Jasmin, Claude, 55 Jeanne d'Arc, 84-85 Jeu, 80 Johnson, Daniel, 49 Jonathas, 24 Jonathas et David ou le trbmphe de 1'amitie, 6 Jones, Dr., 11 Jos Mont/errand, 16 Jouakz-moi d'amour, 101, 104-5 Jour apresjour. See Georges'. Oh Georges Jouvet, Louis, 22 Kean, Edmund, 9 Kennedy, Margaret, 23 Kbndyke, 37-38, 40 Laberge, Marie, 79 Labiche, Eugene, 25 Labor, Ministry of, 82 La Chambre powpre de I'Archeveque, 88

Lachapelle, Andree, 27 La Compagnie Jean Duceppe, Montreal, 17 La complainte des hivers rouges, 96 La Conquete, 5-6, 8 La Coupe stainless, 102-4 La Dalk-des-morts, 57 La Donation, 12-13 La Duchesse de Langeais, 67, 69, 80 La Famille transparente, 84 LAffront commun, 107-8 La Fontaine de Paris, 32 La Frame all-dress, 101 La Gaboche, 90 L'Age de Pierre, 38 La Gbire desfffles a Magbire, 93-94 La Grande Noircew, 22 La Guerre, Yes Sir!, 96-97 La Jalousie du barbouille, 27 Lajeunesse, Emma (Albani), 9 La Lique Nationale d'improvisation (LNI), 88-89

La Magicknne en pantou/ks, 27 La Maison des oiseaux, 54 Lamarche, Father Gustave, 24-25 La Marmaille, Lonqueuil, 80, 90 La Mise a mart dla miss des miss, 83 La Mort de Cesar, 12 Langevin, Andre, 31-33 UAngbmank, 7-8, 13 Languirand, Jacques, 30, 33, 37-40, 91, 116 La Nef'des Sorcieres, 99 La Nuit des rois, 26 Lapalme, Georges, 51 La Parabole, 53 La Passion de Jean-le-Baptiste, 24 La Patriote, Montreal, 67, 86, 98 La Pomnw, 53 Laporte, Pierre, 77 La Poudriere, 27-23 Laprade, Anne-Marie, 88 Laprade, Louise, 99 La Reussite, 24 Laroche, Claude, 84-85 Larocque, Pierre, 88 La Soiree d'improvisation, 84 La Soiree du Cabaret ou Les Rgpubticains frangais, 8 Lassalle, Eugene, 15-16 L'Association canadienne du theatre d'amateur (ACTA), 28, 51, 89 L'Association des directeurs de theatre, 80 L'Association quebecois du jeune theatre (AQJT), 79-80, 89, 90 La Stepette impossible, 86 La Tragedie americaine de /'enfant prodique, 86 Laurendeau, Andre, 21, 30, 49, 53-55 Lawendeau-Dunton Report, 37 Laval University, 101 La vie exemphire d'Alcide kr, k pharamineux et de sa proche descendance, 93 Lavigne, Dominique, 86 Lavigne, Franchise, 26 Lavoie, Aime, 30 Lavoie, Odette, 86 La Vraie Vie des Masquees, 99 Le Barrage, 31, 41 Le Beau DeKre, 53 LeBlanc, Nicole, 83 Le Bourgeois GentiThomme, 6

Index Le Cabaret qui Pouffe, 79 Le Carousel de la gaiete, 29 Le Casino Vokur, 93-94 Lecavalier, Nicole, 99 Le Chandelier, 26 Le Chemin de Lacroix, 101, 103 Le Chemin du roy, 63-64 Le Choix, 24 Le Od, 4 Le Cid Maghane, 55 Leclaire, Armand, 17, 24 Leclerc, Felix, 30-33 L'Ecok des reves, 107, 109-10 Le Coup de 1'etrier, 45 Le Cri de Vengoukvent, 58 Le Cure de village, 29 Le De/aite de I'enfer, 24-25 Le Devoir, 49 Le Diable s'en mek, 24 Le Diner a I'anglask. See L'Anglomanie Leduc, Yvon, 88 L'Effet des rayons gamma sur ks vieux garfons, 57 Le Fleuve au coeur, 79 Le Frere Untel, See Desbiens, Jean-Paul Le Front Commun, 108 Legault, Father Emile, 22-23, 25 Legouve, G.E., 10 Le Grand Cirque Ordinaire (GCO), 84-86, 98, 102 Le Grand Poucet, 102, 104 Le Grand Theatre du Quebec, Quebec, 78 UEgregore, 28, 63 Le Gibet, 37, 39 Le Jeune Labour, 12 La Malade imaginaire, 25 Le Mai court, 26 Le Manteau de GaMe, 52 Le Mariage force, 27 Le Marquis qui perdit, 56 Le Ma/tyre d'une mere, 16 Lemay, Leon, Pamphile, 24 Le Medecin malgre lui, 6 Lemelin, Roger, 17 Lemieux, Jean-Marie, 78 Le Monde de Marcel Dube, 41 Lepage, Monique, 26 Lepage, Roland, 79, 80, 95, 96, 97 Le Pendu, 60 Le Petit Poucet, 104 Les Proces de Jean-Baptiste M., 60, 62

153


Le P'tit Bonheur, 32 Le Quadrille, 53-54 1'Equipe, 23, 32 Le Refus Global, 22 Le Retour de I'exiM, 12 1'Ermitage, Montreal, 23 Le M des Mises a bos Prix, 83-84 Le Sacrifice d'Abraham, 6 Lesage, Jean, 49 Les Apprentis-Sorciers, 26-27, 51 Les Beaux Dimanches, 43 Les Belles-Soeiffs, 53, 66-68, 70 L'Escale, Montreal, 60 Les Canadiens, 30 Lescarbot, Marc, 3 Les Ceintures flechees, 16 Les Celebrations, 91-92 Les Comediens, 54 Les Compagnons de St-Laurent, 22-23, 25-26, 30-31 "Les Enfants de Chenier," 82-83, 107 Les Enfants de Chenier, 83 Les Enfants de Chgnier dans un autre grand spectack d'adieu, 83 Les Faux Brilhnts, 13, 107-9 Les Fees ont soif, 99 Les His de la Liberte, 10-11, 107 Les Friddinades, 29-30, 34 Les Gens d'en Bas, Rimouski, 80, 90 Les Grand Departs, 37, 39-40, 91 Les Grands Soleils, 56 Les Hauls et las bos dans la vie d'une diva, Sarah Menard par ewe memes, 107-8, 110-11 Les Insolites, 37-39 Les Insolubles, 54 CEskabel, Montreal, 87-88 Les Millionaires, 54 Les Nouveaux Dieux, 53 Les Nuits de I'Indiva, 107, 111 Les Oiseaux perdus, 54 Les Parents terribles, 23 Les Patriotes, 10-11, 107 Les Pichous, Montreal, 100 Les P'tit Enfants Laliberte, Montreal, 107 Les Saltimbanques, 51-52, 55 Le Souffle des montagnes, 88 Les Traitants, 59 Les Tburteraux (ou la vieiUesse frappe d I'aube), 83-84 Les Violons de I'automne, 37-38, 40

154

Les Voyagements, Montreal, 92 Le Tartuffe, 4-5, 25 Le Temps des Klas, 25, 41-42, 45 Les Temps de vivre, 24 Le Temps d'une vie, 80, 95 Les Temps Sauvage, 57 Le Testament du Pere Leleu, 23 Le Theatre de Neptune en La Nouvelk France, 3 Le Tic lac Boom, 90 Letondal, Ginette, 26 Letondal, Henri, 17, 24 Letourneau, Jacques, 23, 26 Le Train du ptaisir, 29 Le Trident, Quebec, 78-79, 92-93, 105 Levac, Claude, 63 Levesque, Rene, 50 Levis, Henri, 56 L'Execution, 55 L'Histoire du Quebec, 87 L'Hiver deforce, 56 Lippens, Marie-Josee, 84 Lockquell, Clement, 30 L'Oeil du peuple, 32 Loiselle, Helene, 23, 26 L'Opera des Pauvres, 85 Loranger, Franchise, 30, 59, 63-66, 98, 116 Loret, Hortense Barbe (Rhea), 9 L'Organisation 0, 80 Louis XIII, 109 Louis XIV, 3 Lucas et Cecile, 8 Luchaire, Julian, 23 Lysistrata, 67 McDonough, John Thomas, 21, 78 MacKenzie, William Lyon, 11 Macready, William-Charles, 9 Maillet, Antonine, 53, 103-31 n. 11 Maitres chez nous, 49 Maluron, 30 Mamours et Conjugat, scenes de fa vie amoureuse quebecoise, 107-8 Man and His World, 67, 71. See also Expo '67 "Manifeste pour un theatre au service du peuple," 90 Manon Lastcall, 101, 104-5 Mansion House Hotel. See Montreal Theatre Maple Leaf Forever, 88

Marchand, Felix-Gabriel, 13, 108-9 Marier, Yves-Erick, 87 Marie-Victorin, 24 Marivaux, Pierre, 25 Martin, Gerard, 30 Masson, Jean-Pierre, 23 Mathieu, Thomas, 51 Mechanic's Hall, Montreal, 9 Medium saignant, 63, 65-66 Medium saignant (Revisited), 63 Melbourne, Lord William Lamb, 11 Mercier-Gouin, Yvettse, 24 Mercier, Serge, 80, 95 Mercure, Marthe, 27 Millaire, Albert, 84, 85 Miller, Monique, 26 Moliere, Jean-Baptiste, 4, 6, 8, 23, 25, 27

Mol&re Pop, 78 Molson Theatre. See Theatre Royal Moman, 100-101 Moman fravaille pas, a trap d'ouvrage, 99 Monsieur Fbrin, 53 Montcalm, 16 Montcalm, Louis-Joseph, 56 Montherlant, Henry de, 25 Montmagny, Charles Huault, 3 Montreal Arts Council (MAC), 28, 99 Montreal Municipal Library, 17 Montreal Repertory Theatre, 29 Montreal School of Design, 22 Montreal Summer Festival, 27, 55 Montreal Theatre, 9 Montreal, University of, 16, 51 Monument National, 9, 13-16, 23, 30, 34

Morency, Michel, 86 Morette, Pierre, 51 Morin, Jean-Pierre, 60 Musset, Louis Charles, 23, 25-26 National Arts Centre, Ottawa, 96 National Hockey League, 88, 103-4 National Improvisation League. See La Ligue Nationale d'improvisation National Theatre School, 50 Notre Dame (hall), Montreal, 22 Notre-Dame-de-la Couronne, 25 Nouvelle Compagnie Theatrale (NCT), Montreal, 52, 55, 78-79, 95

Index Obaldia, Rene de, 26, 51 October crisis of 1970, 62, 77 Office de la langue francaise, 49 On n'estpas des en/ants d'ecote, 80 Order of Canada, 37 0-71. See Bingo Pagnol, Marcel, 26 Palais Montcalm, Quebec, 86 Palmieri. See Archambault, Joseph S. Palomino, Mercedes, 23 Papineau, 12 Parent Report, 49 "Parlez-moi d'amour," 104 Parti Quebecois (PQ), 50, 77 Pauvre Amour, 44 Pelletier, Gilles, 23, 26, 52 Pelletier, Pol, 99 Petit Charnplain, Quebec, 79 Petitclair, Pierre, 12-13 Petitjean, Leon, 9, 17 Phi-Phi, 17 Piggery, North Hatley, 102 Pile, 55 Pirandello, Luigi, 26 Pitoeff, Georges, 22 Place des Arts, Montreal, 67, 98 Poirier, Gerard, 27 Poulin, Andre, 86 Prevost, Helene, 84 Prevost, Robert, 23, 25 Priestley, J.B., 26 Prix David, 41 Prix Victor-Morin, 37, 68, 107 Profession je I'aime, 79 Project pour un boideversement des sens ou Vision exotique de Maria Chaplin, 88 Provost, Guy, 23 Pygmalion, 31 Quatre a Quatre, 80, 91-92 4-Saouls, Montreal, 79 Quebec Act, 6 Quebec Assembly, 103 Quesnel, Joseph, 7, 8, 13 Qid est Dupressin?, 54 Quiet Revolution, 49, 56, 66, 108, 116 Racine, Jean, 8, 26-27, 83 Radio-Canada, 17, 30, 37, 41, 63, 69 Reformers, 11 155


Rejane (Gabrielle Charlotte Reju), 10 Renaud, Gilles, 83 Report and Dispatches of the Earl of Durham, Her Majesty's High Commissioner and Governor-General of British North America, 11 Rhea, Mme. See Loret, Hortense Barbe Rhinoceros Party, 56 Ricard, Andre, 93-94 Richard, Maurice, 109 Rinfret, Jean-Claude, 26 Rioux, Monique, 80, 83 R.I.R, 53

Robitaille, Jack, 86 Rodeo et/u&tte, 83 Rollin, Henri, 17 Rondeau, Jean-Leon, 86 Rose Latidippe, 24 Roussin, Andre, 26 Roux, Jean-Louis, 23-25 Royal Circus, 8, 11-12 Royal Society of Canada, 41 Roy, Elzear, 14 Roy, Jean-Pierre, 84-85 Roy, Use, 86 Roy, Louise, 94 Sabourin, Jean-Guy, 26 Sabourin, Marcel, 26, 79 Saia, Louis, 94 Saidye Bronfman Centre, Montreal, 92 St-Denis, Jean, 23, 26 St-Denis (theatre), Montreal, 17 Ste-Carmen de fa Main, 67, 72 St-Eustache, Battle of, 57 St-Jean Baptiste Society, 9, 14, 37, 68 St-Lawrence Centre for the Performing Arts, Toronto, 38 Salacrou, Armand, 23, 25 Salle Denise-Pelletier, Montreal, 78 Salle Fred-Barry, Montreal, 78, 100-102 Sartre, Jean Paul, 23, 51 Savard, Felix-Antoine, 55 Savary, Charlotte, 30 Schisgal, Murray, 51 Scribe, Augustine Eugene, 10 Sganarelk, 27 Shakespeare, William, 9, 23, 25, 52, 83 Shaw, George Bernard, 23, 31 Sheridan, Richard Brinsley, 9 SI Awore m 'etait contee deuxfois, 83 Sicotte, Gilbert, 84-85 156

Si les Sansoucis s'en soucient, ces Sancoucis ci s'en souderont-fls? Bien parkr, c'est se respecter! 83 Simard, Andre, 80 Singer, Robert, 51 Sirois, Serge, 91, 117 Social Welfare, Ministry of, 82 Societe des Auteurs, 80 Societe des Ecrivains, 24 Societe Saint-Jean Baptiste, 107 Soif d'Aimer, 32 Soirees de famiSe, 14 SoJange, 80, 101, 105 Sonnez les matines, 31, 33 Stanley Cup, 103 Steinbeck, John, 52 Stella, Montreal, 17, 27 Strauss et Pssant (Rosa), 91-92 Sullivan, Barry, 9 Sutto, Janine, 23, 26 Tarragon Theatre, Toronto, 67, 92, 95 Televise-moi fa, 29 Ten mppelks-tu Pibrac?, 85 T'es pas tannee, Jeanne d'Arc?, 84, 102 Tessa ou la Nymphe au coeurfidek, 23 Thauvette, Guy, 84-85 Theatre Actuel du Quebec, Quebec, 98 TheStre-Club, Montreal, 26, 28, 31, 37, 41 Theatre d'Aujourd'hui, Montreal, 83, 91 Theatre de la Place Ville-Marie, Montreal, 53 Theatre de la Riposte, Montreal, 80 Theatre de 1'Avant-Pays, Montreal, 80 Theatre de 1'Estoc, Quebec, 55, 78 Theatre de Quat'Sous, Montreal, 52, 60, 67-69, 86, 91

Theatre d'Essai, Montreal, 24 Theatre des Cuisines, Montreal, 99 Theatre de Societe, Montreal, 7 Theatre des Pissenlets, Montreal, 80, 90 Theatre des Varieties, Montreal, 9, 15 Theatre des Voyagements, Montreal, 91 Theatre du Bois de Coulonge, Quebec, 56, 97 Theatre du Horla, Saint-Bruno, 99 Theatre du Meme Nom, (TMN),Montreal, 82-84, 107 Theatre de Nouveau Monde (TNM), Montreal, 25-28, 32, 37, 41, 54-57, 59-60, 82, 96-97, 99-100, 105 Theatre du P'tit Bonheur, Toronto, 101

Theatre du Rideau Vert, Montreal, 24 27-28, 31, 33, 45, 53, 55, 63, 66,

79, 105 Theatre du Vieux-Quebec, Quebec, 78-79 Theatre Escale, Quebec, 51 Theatre Euh!, Quebec, 87, 90 Theatre Experimental de Montreal (T.E.M.), 80, 88, 99 Theatre in the Americas Festival, 110 Theatre Maisonneuve, 67 Theatre National, Montreal, 15 Theatre Parminou, Victoriaville, 86-87 Theatre Plus, 67, 70 Theatre Populate du Quebec (TPQ), 51, 63, 79, 84-85

Theatre Port Royal, Montreal, 98 Theatre pour Enfants de Quebec, Quebec, 78 Theatre Quotidien de Quebec (TQQ), 101-2, 104-5 Theatre Royal, Montreal, 9 Theatre Royal du Marche a Foin, Quebec, 8 Theatre St-Louis, Quebec, 8 Theoret, France, 99 Theriault, Yves, 30 Tit-Goq, 34-35, 41 Toronto Drama Bench, 37 Tbujours plus gros, 87 Tbupin, Paul, 24, 31-32 Tree, Ellen, 8 Tremblay, Michel, 52-53, 59, 66-73, 80, 91-92, 94, 97, 104-6, 116-7 Trident, 55 Troupe des Treize, 101-2

Index Un Bonheur en attire un autre, 13 Une Amie d'enfance, 94 Une Brosse, 105-6 Une Femme douce, 28 Une Maison ... unjour, 63-64 Une Rzrtie de compagne, 13 UNESCO, 80

Un Fils & tuer, 24, 31 Union Nationale, 49, 103 Unions des artistes, 80 Un Manage a la Gaumine, 16 Un Matin comme les attires, 44-45 Un ftiys dont la devise estje m'oubtie, 107, 109 Un Prince, monjour viendra, 86, 98 Un Simple SoJdat, 41-43 Vallieres, Pierre, 77 Vancouver Cultural Centre, 70 Van Druten, John, 27 Vaudreuil, P., 56 Vian, Boris, 51 Vigneault, Rejean, 79 Villeneuve, Lionel, 23, 26 Voltaire, Frangois-Marie, 12 War Measures Act, 62, 77 Western Quebec Regional Drama Festival, 52 Williams, Tennessee, 28, 45 Wittlinger, Karl, 51 World Puppet Theatre Festival, 80 World Theatre Festival, 80 World War 1, 16 Zindel, Paul, 67 Zone, 41, 42, 45

157

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