Abstract EN:

In the first half of the eighteenth century, the theaters of the Saint-Germain and Saint-Laurent fairs were frequently accused of challenging the monopoly of the Comédie- Française, and they had to find all kinds of strategies to overcome prohibitions against dialogue, speaking French, and even appearing in scenes: plays with monologues, jargon, pantomimes, preceded the development of puppets. The requirements of the French Royal Academy of Music lead to the creation of new genres such as the pieces par écriteaux or the opéra-comique. Despite the popularity of these shows, the rich diversity of the repertoire that was produced in spite of the academic restrictions, is poorly known: the famous anthology of Le Sage and d'Orneval tainted the way the Fair theatre has been known and received. In this thesis we will attempt to edit around thirty plays and to analyse everything that was ruled out, which we call the “other repertoire”. It is also the history of the Fair theatre that we intend to rebuild for the period between 1717 and 1727, relying on many unknown archives, such as notarial protocols. Setting up a calendar allows us to rethink the fairground historiography and to set at 161 the number of plays performed after the return of the Italian actors and before Pontau's beginning at the Opéra-Comique.