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Denis, Jean-Luc

Maverick Quebec-based director/writer/translator/actor and founding artistic director of Groupe Multidisciplinaire de Montréal/GMM.

In 1979 Jean-Luc Denis graduated from the Conservatoire d'art dramatique de Montréal, before beginning a career of acting and directing. Among his early productions are Martin Sherman's Bent, Thomas Bernhardt's Le President, and Peter Weiss's L'Instruction. He acted in Normand Chaurette's Provincetown Playhouse, juillet 1919, j'avais 19 ans, and Jean-François Caron's J'écrirai une pièce bientôt sur les négres. Among the works he has directed with GMM are Voila ce qui se passe à Orangeville/This is What Happened in Orangeville by Hillar Liitoja and 1968.

As a translator he has tackled Rainer Werner Fassbinder's The Bitter Tears of Petra Von Kant (Les larmes amère de Petra Von Kant), Frank Wedekind's Spring Awakening (L'Éveil du printemps), Franz Xaver Kroetz's Through the Leaves (Qui marche dans les feuilles), and John Osbourne's Look Back in Anger (Jeune homme en colère).

His work as a director is marked by high visuals and a transgressive spirit. For instance, in his production of Voila..., he had one actor bouncing rubber balls which would often hit spectators while another went in and out of the audience carrying an axe; the tranquil and safe confines of the theatre had suddenly been unpleasantly transformed, as surely as the little town of Orangeville had been transformed by the murders which occurred there.

Profile by Gaetan Charlesbois

Last updated 2020-06-15