Yasmina Reza

Yasmina Reza ( born May 1, 1959 in Paris) is a French actress and writer. In particular, through their pieces of "art", "Three times life " and " God of Carnage " it was in the past ten years the world's most performed contemporary playwright.

Origin and family

" My life was thoroughly banal ," Reza says about himself "I was born in Paris, went to school in Paris, studied in Paris. [ ... ] What is, however, less trivial, is my home [ ... ] ". Yasmina Reza comes from a widely branched Jewish family. "My father was Iranian, Hungarian, my mother, my grandparents are buried somewhere in America."

Yasmina Reza said in 2014 on the question of how it is currently living with Jewish and Iranian roots, I do not have specific Iranian vein. I have been to anywhere a vein. In the note, she had recorded in the Roman nowhere, she retained from childhood no marks, no memories, clarified Reza: I think that my parents have transferred any of their youth, their countries, their language and their religion. I have preserved more than a favor for some things, such as the music. Besides, I can not say that I come from somewhere.

Above all, her father's family looks back on an eventful history. As Sephardic Jews have resided there until about 500 years ago in Spain, emigrated from there to Persia, late 19th century to Moscow, and in 1918 finally - in the chaos of the Russian Revolution - to Paris. Under the pressure to conform, they were converted over the centuries, at times, at least outwardly, to Catholicism or Islam, and her family name changed from Gedaliah (Hebrew ) about Reza (Persian ) to Rezaiov (Russian) and finally back to Reza and - for the Israeli branch the family - to Gedaliah.

Yasmina Reza grew up in Paris, the adopted home of her grandparents, on - " with wonderful parents in cultured and prosperous conditions ". Music had a special place in family life. Her mother was a violinist and her father, an engineer by profession, played the piano. "I would certainly not call my family as a musician family, but as a family of passionate music lovers. My father used in robe to put kids in front of us and to conduct Beethoven's Fifth, while this was recording with the Berlin Philharmonic. "

2014 said Reza on the finding that she had not learned German from her father nor her mother to play the violin: I had learned to develop myself without parents.

Yasmina Reza lives in Paris and has a daughter and a son.

Artistic development

After her studies in acting - first at the University of Paris X and later at the Ecole Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq Jacques Lecoq from - Reza had numerous engagements on the French stage in plays contemporary and classic authors. In 1987, she then began to write itself. "I loved the theater, and I loved the language, so it was logical to write for the theater ." The Success was not long in coming. Already their first two pieces were awarded the prestigious French theater price Molière. Her third, "art", became the best in the world success. It received several awards and international ( including the Tony Award and the Laurence Olivier Award) and was her breakthrough to the world's most performed contemporary playwright. With the growing fame as a playwright were offers to the actress Yasmina Reza - with the exception of a rather random commitments in the Paris initial staging its second major theater success, "Three times life ". Since then, she believes it is possible to perform in one of her pieces, perhaps even directing.

End of the 90 -year extended Reza her oeuvre by screenplays and prose. When asked if she had wanted greater freedom to switch to prose, she said, so be it

A bit like the life: There are a thousand ways, but few of them can be implemented. If you are not focused when writing early enough on certain things, the total freedom quickly turns into distress. That's why I like specifications, including and especially in prose. In school, sometimes the task we were asked, a story with a certain number of words to invent a certain number of characters and a single scene - I loved that

Exactly why is and remains the drama of their favored genre.

The modern theater is a kind of summit to specifications, the Kingdom of concentration. You can not put 400 people on the stage, you can not comment on what the characters say, do not correct what they think you only have limited time. The trick is to develop the greatest fantasy within this fixed frame.

In connection with the cosmopolitanism of her family known Reza, their only home is the French language. This had an impact on her creative process, to what you would be important when writing. " As is spoken on stage, interested me more than what is said there. It often happens that I use words because they sound good at a certain point, and not because they are right on this particular point. " This particular affinity for the sound of the language corresponds with their appreciation for the music (" I think the music for the greatest of all the arts" ), but does not lead to l' art pour l'art. Especially their best pieces are content- rich and conflict-ridden, her characters vivid and emotional.

A unifying element of almost all of its main characters is their origin from an upper middle-class Jewish milieu, another their relation to the arts. Both points to an autobiographical background to the Reza also expressly acknowledges. " I believe that you can really write well only about his own obsessions ." However, that does not mean for them to describe experiences, but to explore possibilities. " For me, writing is an exploration of the human, an opening up of the unknown. Writing allows me to live other lives. "

Chekhov's influences are in their dramas often interpreted what Reza can apply for no more than their first two pieces. The current classification to the Boulevard Theatre (often in Germany ) she dismisses. At this labeling occurs most likely when the part of the staging of Reza's slapstick joke made ​​when not perceived how complex their pieces, as well as close to the deadly seriousness they are.

Your relationship with the laughter and happiness Reza describes as:

"I love to laugh, but that does not mean that I 'm happy at the moment. [ ... ] The most brilliant people are always pessimists. They are also the most humorous. I have never laughed really optimist. [ ... ] The purpose of art is to shed additional light on the lives and give our se but rather dreary existence a bit of shine. The art is to enable the people in a dimension that is above the everyday, they should make him more intelligent. Whether man, this also happier, I doubt it. "

With " Early in the morning, evening or night " ( " L' aube le soir ou la nuit", 2007), she wrote a long report about Nicolas Sarkozy, whom she accompanied a year during the presidential election campaign.

In 2014 it turned to Stefan Brandle Question: You describe a man of good political triumphs, but personally can hardly pleased. Could this not be a character from your new novel? She answers: Just [ ... ] In Sarkozy's case something happens that I can understand. He was easily elected, but at the same time leave of his wife. During the campaign, the two played a pair, but in reality his private life was very complicated, while he pursued successfully for election campaign.

With the 2013 novel, Heureux les heureux Reza was the view of Tilman Krause at a well -made prose arrived, the abschnurrt cheerful and plump live before the reader, but a short pleasure one ... probably forgets quickly again ..

Together with Roman Polanski, she wrote the screenplay for the film adaptation of her stage play God of Carnage ( 2011). This earned her include the French César film award.

Plays

• Calls after a funeral ( "Conversations après un enterrement ", 1987), Prix Molière
• Travel in the winter ( " La Traversée de l' hiver", 1989)
• Art ( " Art", 1994), Prix Molière, Tony Award in 1998, translated into 40 languages. Premiered in 1994 in Paris. German by Eugen Helmle. ISBN 978-3-905707-22-9
• The man of chance ( " L' homme du hasard ", 1995)
• Three times life ( " Trois versions de la vie", 2000), world premiere at the Burgtheater in Vienna, directed by Luc Bondy. Translated by Eugen Helmle. ISBN 978-3-909081-87-5
• A Spanish Piece ( "Une pièce espagnole ", 2004). German by Frank Heibert and Hinrich Schmidt- Henkel. ISBN 978-3-909081-98-1
• A gramophone ( "Une lumière ", 2006)
• God of Carnage ( " Le dieu du carnage ", 2006), world premiere at the Schauspielhaus Zurich, directed by Jürgen Gosch. German by Frank Heibert and Hinrich Schmidt- Henkel. ISBN 978-3-905707-15-1
• Your version of the game was premiered on October 2, 2012 in Berlin at the Deutsches Theater, director Stephan Kimmig

Prose

• Fortepiano. A sonata, 1998. German by Eugen Helmle. ISBN 3-250-60023-7.
• A despair ( "Une Désolation ", 1999 ), 2001. German by Eugen Helmle. ISBN 3-446-19978-0.
• Adam Haberberg ( " Adam Haberberg ", 2004), 2005. German by Frank Heibert and Hinrich Schmidt- Henkel. ISBN 3-446-20575-6.
• In the carriage of Arthur Schopenhauer ( " Dans la luge d' Arthur Schopenhauer ," 2005), 2006. Übers by Frank Heibert and Hinrich Schmidt- Henkel ISBN 3-446-20720-1.
• Nowhere. German by Frank Heibert and Hinrich Schmidt- Henkel, accents Edition Hanser, Carl Hanser Verlag, Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-446-23501-4. ( " Ninny part", 2005)
• Early in the morning, evening or at night ( " L' aube le soir ou la nuit", 2007), 2008. Übers by Frank Heibert and Hinrich Schmidt- Henkel. ISBN 3-446-23029-7.
• Your version of the game. German by Frank Heibert and Hinrich Schmidt- Henkel. Dragonfly Publishing, Lengwil ( Switzerland ) / Konstanz 2011, ISBN 978-3-905707-46-5.
• Heureux les heureux, Roman. Éditions Flammarion, Paris, 2013, ISBN 978-2-081-29445-5. Happy are the lucky ones. Novel. From the French by Frank Heibert and Hinrich Schmidt- Henkel. Hanser, Munich 2014, ISBN 978-3-446-24482-5.

Screenplays

• The picnic of Lulu Kreutz ( " Le Pique Nique de Lulu Kreutz - " ), 2000, with a film of Reza's life partner Didier Martiny with Philippe Noiret. German edition translated by Frank Heibert and Hinrich Schmidt- Henkel. ISBN 978-3-905707-18-2

• Jusqu'à la nuit, 1983

More Awards

• 2005 WORLD Literature Prize
• 2009 Tony Award 2009