Françoise Nyssen, Minister of Culture, in full agreement with Gilbert Meyer, Mayor of Colmar, Jean Rottner, President of the Regional Council of the Great East, Brigitte Klinkert, President of the Departmental Council of the Haut-Rhin, and Jean Tschaen, President of the association of the Comedy of the East, gave his approval to the proposal to appoint Emilie Capliez and Matthieu Cruciani to the direction of the Comedy of the East, national dramatic center of Colmar.
Actors and directors trained at the Ecole de la Comédie de Saint-Etienne, Emilie Capliez and Matthieu Cruciani are aged 40 and 43 respectively. Exploring in turn the classical repertoire and the texts of living or contemporary authors, their theatre is concerned with the text in all its richness and diversity, the word and the actors. Their shows are the crossroads between theatre and music.
For the Comedy of the East, a historic site of dramatic decentralization located at a crossroads of Europe, they propose an artistic and cultural project giving pride of place to the young public theatre, open to music and other artistic disciplines, but also on Europe. They will be surrounded by an artistic collective of directors, actors, authors, scenographers, musicians and a choreographer. Each of these artists will be directly involved in the many artistic actions they have imagined for Colmar and its territory. Thus, with their project «Encrages», which will give rise to the writing of a play from the collection of the word of inhabitants (the first year, on the theme of the influence of migration on the language).
With «Europe Express», the two future directors will take a look at European creation, bringing to Colmar shows from Germany or Switzerland, but also from the Baltic States, Greece and Scotland. Because they have the ambition to bring the theatre as close as possible to the inhabitants, each year they will create a show in a village and offer shows that can be played in classrooms, in media libraries and other places not dedicated to the theatre. And because the history of the Comédie de l'Est is intimately linked to music, they will propose the creation of a lyrical form for young audiences and spectator journeys with the musical scenes of the territory.
The 1er January 2019, they will succeed Guy-Pierre Couleau, who for ten years has constantly ensured that the Comédie de l'Est is as close as possible to the inhabitants of Colmar.