Strange comings and goings in a boarding house kept by two old Buddhist Asian women: the recalcitrant cook chats up the idle chamber maid by going to fetch crabs in the attic; a hunted man, after sensual exchanges with a bare chested boy, ends up upstairs and dies; a motionless female client unsettles, by her silence, the habits of the household who dance before her… 

 Claude Mouriéras likes to take liberties with the works he adapts for the screen. Of Mort de rire, the wacky and cynical show by the duo Monnier-Duroure, there remain only a few swinging floor dances, burlesque lifts, and a drawn-out atmosphere where boredom is a stylistic device. However, while the film may appear far removed from the show, each image is an embryo of a story; a virtual narration slips in between each shot, and the short film, just like the show, moves forward by associations of gestural ideas. Mort de rire was the last choreography that Mathilde Monnier and Jean-François Duroure composed together. Since then, each has their own company.

Source : Patrick Bossatti

Mathilde Monnier holds a reference position in the French and international contemporary dance landscape. Her creations continuously defy expectations thanks to constant renewal. Her nomination as director of the Centre Chorégraphique de Montpellier Languedoc-Roussillon in 1994 has initiated a series of collaborations with people coming from different artistic domains. From artist Beverly Semmes to philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy from film director Claire Denis, Mathilde Monnier has always pushed the boundaries of a work she sees as an experience above all. Musical creation holds an important position with very varied collaborations within the fields of popular as well as scholarly music - jazz musician Louis Sclavis, composers David Moss and Heiner Goebbels, virtuoso platinist eriKm. More recently, she has used PJ Harvey's rock music but also the pink pop settings 2008 vallée, the show she co-created with singer Philippe Katerine. It came to a glorious end in the Main Courtyard at the 2008 Avignon festival. Fascinated by the concept of unison, she created the pastoral Tempo 76 show at the Montpellier Danse 07 festival on Gyôrgy Ligeti's music. In february 2008 she was commissionned by the Berlin Philarmonic Orchestra conducted by Simon Rattle to choreograph Heiner Goebbels opera, Surrogate Cities. More than 130 amateurs went on stage to take part to an opera dealing with the city and the power struggle within. The same year, she presented the burlesque duet Gustavia in which she appeared along with spanish performance artist La Ribot at the Montpellier Danse 08 festival. In 2009, she created Pavlova 3'23'', in reference to the classical ballet The Death of The Swan. In 2010, working in close collaboration with visual artist Dominique Figarella, Mathilde Monnier created the show Soapéra, and subsequently paid homage to Merce Cunningham by way of the show Un américain à paris. In 2011, together with choreographer Loïc Touzé and writer Tanguy Viel, Mathilde Monnier created Nos images, a work focusing on film. Together with Jean-François Duroure, she restaged Pudique acide / Extasis at the Festival Montpellier Danse 11, two duos that the choreographers created in 1984 and 1985.

Source : Mathilde Monnier 

En savoir plus : www.mathildemonnier.com