Les Fourberies de Scapin ・ Comédie-Française

Twenty years after the previous production of Les Fourberies de Scapin, Denis Podalydès opened the 2017-2018 season with this major work by Molière, which has been performed more than 1,500 times by the Comédiens-Français.

“A troupe play, written not for the Court but for the people”, it premiered in 1671 at the Palais-Royal during a period of construction work. For this play, Molière wished to free himself of the constraints of comédies-ballets and machinery-driven comedies and come back to “pure theatre”, thus offering the director a great freedom.

The action is set in Naples, opening a door onto an imagined maritime world stretching towards the Orient. Faced with two authoritarian fathers, two sons, both of whom are thwarted lovers, turn to the crafty Scapin, who is driven by a mad desire for revenge. The character is a double of Scaramouche, the Italian actor of the adventurous life whom Molière admired: “to tell you the truth, there are few things that are impossible for me, when I put my mind to them” declares the buffoonish servant whose name, as Denis Podalydès points out, derives his from the Italian scappare which means “to escape”, “to scamper off”. Scapin is beaten with a stick at one point but also gets his own back and, in an ambiance of ransom demands and paternal contradictions, he comes up with an avalanche of stratagems and other tricks Molière excels in depicting. After more than three months of touring France in autumn 2018, the production is returning to the boards of the Salle Richelieu.
Denis Podalydès

Comedy in 3 acts

Production premiered on: 20 Sept 2017 Salle Richelieu
Work first performed: 24 May 1671 at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal
Comédie-Française premiere: 4 September 1680 at the Théâtre de l’Hôtel Guénégaud
1,678 performances of the work by the Comédie-Française since the premiere, including 174 in this production.

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