La farce du témoin (The Witness)
Channel: Leif Harmsen
Date: 2015-06-12

A mother and her daughter are in a heated discussion. The mother tries to determine what to do after Colin dishonoured her daughter. Thankfully there is a witness: Guillot des Noix (Billy the Nut) who saw everything. Mother and daughter seek the Judge to give their version of the events and to present their case. Armed with her written account, the daughter and her mother present their case to the Judge. The mother wants reparation for the dishonour caused to her daughter by Colin. The seducer only succeeded because he promised to marry her. The Judge summonses Colin to appear in front of him and confronts him with the question: Did you carnally know this girl? Colin denies it. The mother calls him a liar and he replies in kind. She says she can prove her allegations. Colin dares her to do it. She produces her witness: Guillot.

After swearing in the witness, the Judge asks him what he knows about the girl. The Witness evades the question and in a series of lengthy answers compares the good old days and the immoral present. The Judge keeps redirecting the question without much luck until the witness finally admits that if sex is done the same way today as it was practiced in the good old days, then all is done and accomplished. He than recounts the meeting between Colin and the girl. He declares that she was resisting Colin’s advances, demanding that he promise to marry her. Colin then lowered his voice and said fromage instead of marriage to fool her in thinking he had said the word without saying it. Colin then completed his business to his satisfaction. Guillot tells the Judge he saw everything through a hole in the wall between his house and theirs. The Judge does not need to hear more. He declares Colin guilty and condemns him to pay 100 sous to the poor, to ask Marion for forgiveness on bare knees and to pay the court fees before he can leave jail. Furthermore, he will have to march to his local church with drums and bagpipes where he will marry Marion. The mother and daughter leave the court happy, Colin curses women and the witness. When they are all gone, Guillot addresses the audience to summarise the moral of the play: nobody should swear when knowingly lying.

Le Théâtre L’On Donne
Metteur en scène Mario Longtin 

Comédiens:
Massimiliano Aravecchia (Le Juge)
David Heap (Le Beau Colin)
Heather Kirk (Marion)
Jessy Neau (La Mère)
Emilie Pilon-David (Le Témoin - Guillot des Noix)

For more than a decade, Le Théâtre L’On Donne (based in London, Ontario) has presented one production in French every year. Le Théâtre L’On Donne is made of graduate students and professors from the department of French Studies at The University of Western Ontario. La farce du témoin has not been staged since it was performed in Rouen (France) in the 16th Century. 

Mario Longtin is Associate Professor of French at The University of Western Ontario. He is a medievalist, a philologist and a historian of theatre. Mario has been artistic director of Le Théâtre L’On Donne for 10 years and has directed numerous shows for the company, including Britannicus (Racine), Ubu roi (Jarry), Le Vrai Monde (Michel Tremblay) and Dessine-moi un mouton, a collage of two farces (Jenin fils de rien and Deux Gentilshommes et le poulier) with excerpts taken from Dario Fo’s Mistero Buffo. Mario is currently editing the 16th Century manuscript from Rouen, France (BnF fr. 24341) from which La farce du témoin  is taken. Mario is the Chief Editor of ROMARD.

Presented by The Festival of Early Drama at Toronto, June 2015