Les Mardis de Mallarmé(1998)

Every Tuesday, Mallarmé received guests, and people flocked to his house to hear him. Renoir, Gide, Claudel, Henri de Régnier, Barrès, Debussy and Valéry were among those who listened to these evenings. In their diaries or correspondence, the American poet Sadakitchi Hartman, Mallarmé's son-in-law Edmond Bonniot, and the French poet Jean de Tinan evoke the Master, standing in front of the tiled stove, recounting repartees, aphorisms, judgements, anecdotes, sentences and memories. A documentary mixing photos, objects, drawings, engravings and real shots attempts to restore the place, the small dining room, its furniture, and the ritual of the evenings with the chairs that are brought in, the punch that is offered, the tobacco that is smoked. Jean-Paul Fargier once again brings together these prestigious listeners in the setting he has reconstructed.