Laurent Tirard

MOLIERE

Screening room

Status: Completed

Director(s): Laurent Tirard

Main cast: Romain Duris, Fabrice Luchini, Laura Morante

Long synopsis : 1644, Paris, and 22 year-old Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, also known as Moliere, is not yet the writer that history recognizes as the father and true master of comic satire, author of “The Misanthrope” and “Tartuffe”, and a dramatist to rank alongside Shakespeare and Sophocles. Far from it. He is, in fact, a failed actor. His Illustrious Theatre Troupe, founded the previous year, is bankrupt. Hounded by creditors, Moliere is thrown into jail, released, then swiftly imprisoned again. When the jailors finally let him go, he disappears. The combined efforts of historians have unearthed no trace of him before his reappearance, several months later, when his troupe begins touring the provinces - a tour that will last for thirteen years, and culminate in Moliere's triumphant return to Paris in 1658. But what happened to Molière during these mysterious lost months ? Moliere, we discover, has been released from prison by a wealthy bourgeois, Monsieur Jourdain, who settled the young actor’s debts on the understanding that he will teach him the craft of the stage. Jourdain, hungry for recognition, is infatuated with the lovely but poisonous Célimene, whose salon gathers together suitors and great wits. But the affair must remain secret, kept at all costs from Jourdain’s wife Elmire, a wonderful woman with whom Moliere himself will fall headlong in love. Unfortunately for him, Jourdain has presented Moliere as Monsieur Tartuffe, an austere private tutor, to justify his presence. And Elmire has nothing but the harshest words for this holier-than-thou figure who has invaded her home. Trapped in this untenable situation, Moliere will experience all manner of events that will open his eyes and his mind, both to life itself and to his work as an artist. And it is from the heart of this tale, from his passion for Elmire, that Moliere the great dramatist is born.