Seuls en Scène 2021 presents Trois annonciations

Three actresses on stage, Silvia Costa, Itsaso Arana and Audrey Bonnet, reclaim the mystery of the annunciation taking place between the Virgin Mary and the Angel Gabriel, personified by each of them in their mother tongue. Three monologues, in Italian, Spanish, French. Three performative speeches dig this furrow to question this mysterious announcement today, to draw it to the side of modernity. In this device, the public becomes the depositary of the revelation, it is in a position to receive, in the listening state of the Virgin.

What could we announce in our time? What could be the contemporary annunciations? The ecological disaster to come? The end of the world? The advent of new ages? A step backward? Everything is opened and imagination prevails.

The play is divided into three parts of equal importance: around 30 minutes for each one. The play lasts around 1h 30, a rather classical time. Three separate pictures or sequences, featuring three different places and times in history. Three acts: the first one being closest to the famous Italian Quatrocento, that splendorous era of art history, a period lost in time with its dreams of beauty and invention of very elaborate and refined pictorial art works, painted with utmost precision and care. The second act is set in Spain, during the Holy week. It expresses the ardent devotion, blood and passion, and the overwhelming beauty of the Good Friday procession. It is rooted in times to come, in the human quest to understand the world, and its metaphysical need for answers. As for the last act, it is set in a remote future, maybe in space and in the presence of a cosmonaut. Somehow the play follows the pace of the world, starting in the past and heading towards the future, and into the unknown. Yet this time, connection deliberately remains unclear, as if the scene were viewed through a slightly dirty magnifying glass, as if things were happening behind a veil.

The screening of this filmed performance is free and open to Princeton students, faculty and staff. Advance registration is required.

Register for Trois annonciations

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