The Edouard VII theater was almost full on Wednesday, September 27th for “Lapin,” Samuel Benchetrit’s new play written for Muriel Robin and Pierre Arditi.
It is 8:15 pm when the lights go out to reveal the duo. The plot? Two actors, Pierre Arditi and Muriel Robin, have a day off at the VII theater when they realize that 700 spectators are in front of them. Did the author lie to them?
“The play was starting to find its cruising speed,” says Constant A., one of the spectators present that evening with his father Gilles. “Until the moment when ‘Pierre’ thinks he is the victim of a trickery by the author and decides to call him. He grabbed a cell phone and that’s when we saw that there was a problem,” continues Constant A.
“Arditi began to mutter ‘mmm mmm mmm’. It took Muriel Robin a second to realize that he had a problem. She tried to revive the scene by saying, ‘Do you need to call the author?’ But he didn’t react. So she asked for the curtain to be lowered by making gestures to the technicians.”
The audience did not immediately understand that Pierre Arditi, 78 years old, was suffering from discomfort, initially thinking it was part of the staging. “It took the theater management announcing the need to evacuate the room for people to realize what had happened before our eyes,” says Constant, a big fan of the actor and still in shock.
At 8:40 pm, the theater was empty and an ambulance arrived. Anne Le Nen, Muriel Robin’s partner, was seen a few minutes later. “His life is not in danger,” her entourage told AFP later in the evening.
“He is conscious, he was hospitalized for tests, his life is not in danger,” clarified the source, stating that it was “not a stroke” after examination.
