When Simon Boudreault, artistic director of the Théâtre de l’Œil, approached her to write the next play for his company, Fanny Britt did not hesitate.
“It immediately tempted me,” recalls the playwright, who has had very little experience with puppet theater in her career.
This proposal to write for an audience of 6 to 10 years old came “just at the right time”. At the time when his youngest son was quietly leaving childhood behind.
It is into the world of Octave, a lonely boy, and Delphine, a little girl with learning difficulties, that she immersed herself. Two children from very different backgrounds who become friends.
“On the surface, Delphine is a very free child, very extroverted, comfortable in her own skin, funny… Octave seems a little more stuck up. He is afraid of many things. There are a lot of rules in his head that are very difficult to break,” explains the author.
Over the course of their budding friendship – and conflicting, at times, explains Fanny Britt – they will teach each other to push back their fears.
Since Octave is “a pianist who plays his instrument wonderfully well,” the music, by Ariane Moffatt, occupies an important place in 176 Pas.
“The central point, of course, is the piano. There are a lot of interventions during which Octave practices,” explains the singer-songwriter when asked about the musical universe of the piece.
But, like Ariane Moffatt, there is also the presence of synthesizers, which illustrate a certain transformation in Octave. Added to this are the harp and brass instruments.
This is the very first time that Ariane Moffatt has designed music for a play. Would she like to repeat the experience? ” Yes ! Being at the service of other worlds is super enriching,” she replies, wishing to work again for the theater or even for the cinema.
Ariane Moffatt found the project all the more stimulating because it is aimed directly at children the age of her boys. “It’s a source of motivation, of inspiration! »
Shortly before receiving La Presse at the Maison de la culture Claude-Léveillée, where the 176 Pas team is rehearsing, Ariane Moffatt and Fanny Britt attended a routine in front of an audience made up of young people and adults. It is the reaction of the latter which particularly marked the playwright. “We felt that there were a lot of emotions from former children,” she summarizes.
Certain themes covered are likely to resonate with an older audience. “Today it hit me during the routine. I was like, ‘My God! I’m talking to myself in this room,” Fanny Britt realized. What about ? “The pleasure of creating. »
Octave’s mother is a very rigid character, explains Fanny Britt. “One of the things she wants to control in him is the desire to create, because she is afraid that he will lose his temper, that it will not work for him, that he will be disappointed, that it is rejected. »
However, Octave tries to explain to him the beauty of creating and what it gives him. “Before, there was nothing, and now there is something,” illustrates the character, in his child’s words.
Accustomed to addressing a youth audience, particularly through her books, including Truffe and Louis Among the Specters, Fanny Britt is also concerned about access to culture and performing arts for children.
“All creative structures, and even traditional media structures, are collapsing. It is more important than ever to maintain the encounter between [the] human beings who create and [the] human beings who are in the process of creating themselves,” she believes.
A piece like 176 Steps can open up discussion on a host of topics, she argues: “dyslexia, difference at school, anxiety, bereavement, the loss of a parent, the nature of friendship “.
This is the case of this piece, but of many others as well, she concludes.
