A great lady of the theatre, in her most universal dimension, has left us.
Founder of the Living Theatre with Julian Beck, Judith Malina deeply marked the second part of the 20e century to the last few years, on both sides of the Atlantic, with a troupe of actors who collectively knew how to say the power of theatre, claiming its ability to question consciences and question the world.
The Living Theatre will have represented an avant-garde but also the courage to affirm a saving utopia that will challenge the European and American scenes, and will also be able to involve the spectators in an active participation process.
With him, a network of friendship and work was built over time. The Living Theatre carried the words of Artaud, Cocteau or Genet, he received the solidarity of artists like Sartre or Montand in his universalist struggles for freedom. These exchanges were nourished by important moments at the Avignon Festival, in 1968 first, at the invitation of Jean Vilar for the show Paradise Now, then in 1999 at the invitation of Alain Crombecque and the Académie Expérimentale des Théâtres, and in 2013 finally, as part of the highlight Eloge du Désordre et de la Maîtrise, organized by Stanislas Nordey and Michelle Kokosowski.
Judith Malina had also shown her attention to transmission issues during one of her last appearances in Paris in June 2012 with the company Motus at the Théâtre de la Ville, while Stanislas Nordey had reenacted the words and thought of the Living Theatre with the students of the TNB school.
It remains the symbol of this spirit of freedom and the necessary breath of a committed theatre that always seeks to reinvent its actions, while constantly asserting itself as a political act.
I extend my sincere condolences to his loved ones.