Critical Failure

excecutive production SITuation COMédie & les Laboratoires D’Aubervilliers,

support from: la Fondation des Artistes, le département 9, Centre National de la Danse & La Villa Arson.

release: november 2022 / length: 40mn

Producer/ Director’s assistant: Silina Syan
Producer: Adela Noual
Director of Photography: Hoang Le Nguyen
Alternative Camera: Ema Lauro
Sound engineer: Nino Ram
Music: Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley

Actors:
Ekko: Lucas Tetry Rivière
Désiré.e: Brandon Gercera
Youssef: Phœnix Atala
Tanger: Snake Ninja
André.e: Valérie Abrogoua
Hanabi: Hanabi The K
Maxime: Océan

Critical Failure is all at once a Sci Fi movie, an unfinished script about the image of queer non-white communities, an editing in progress, an attempt to discover a new method to make films, a series of ethical, aesthetical, political and practical questions, a sum of obstacles and revelations, a story that describes what it is to figure out that you’re different and that it’s that figuring out which sets you free.

Ekko is an artist in residency at an art center, she finds out that she is a robot. She decides to take hack of her own program thanks to a secret choreography she learns from a militant android gang. She can then sever her ties to the institution that owns her and take control of her own body. While this story is unraveling we follow a gay couple who decides to make this anticipation film. They want to challenge the mainstream, normative way the industry makes movies and are trying to figure out a relevant and specific way to tell their queer artist stories. This narration is about emancipation, mirroring Ekko’s adventures.

The Formula experimental sitcom

The Formula is a web series where screenwriting technics are over-analysed.

click CC for subtitles

written and directed by : Phoenix Atala
staring : Phoenix Atala, Michèle Gurtner, Aurélia Petit, Yves-Noël Genod, Michèle Bargues, Viviana Moins…
executive producer : Situation Comédie
Coproducer : Le Musée de la Danse dans le cadre de la mission Accueil-studio, le festival Hors Pistes Centre Pompidou,
Nanterre-Amandiers, centre dramatique national.

Date City Venue
16/09/17 Paris Festival Hors Pistes/Centre Pompidou
Time: 6:00pm. Age restrictions: All Ages.
20/05/17 Nanterre Théâtre des Amandiers
Time: 6:00pm. Age restrictions: All Ages.
25/02/17 Nanterre Théâtre des Amandiers
Time: 7:00pm. Age restrictions: All Ages.

The Contemporary Artist Video Game

THE CONTEMPORARY ARTIST is a video game where the main character is a struggling performing artist.

Executive production : Situation Comédie
Coproduction : Nanterre-Amandiers, DICREAM

TO PLAY CLICK HERE

downoad the mac game

Y = Yes
N = No➡ = right  ⬅ = left ⬆ = up ⬇ = down
C= Scroll contacts P = Call
Q = Exit
S = Start the game
space bar = Pause
space bar(pause) and  S (restart) = restart the game

Date City Venue
04/10/19 _ Laboratoires d’Aubervilliers
Time: 8:00pm. Address: 41 rue Lecuyer.
07/10/17 - 15/10/17 Paris La Gaïté Lyrique
Time: 12:00pm. Age restrictions: All Ages.
29/04/17 - 20/05/17 Nanterre Théâtre des Amandiers
Time: 7:00pm. Age restrictions: All Ages.

How to write standing Up inconsistently funny solo

How to write standing Up is a solo show where Phoenix Atala explains the rules of comedy while storytelling his private life. He describes the step by step method of how to make a show: the best way to find an idea, meet with curators and master writing techniques.
Sometimes the rules of comedy are applied, sometimes they’re broken.
Sometimes the jokes are funny, sometimes they fail.

« Tonight you are going to attend a different kind of stand up comedy routine, the kind where laughing is not the main goal, Tonight I would like to lead a reflection on comedy, the research of ideas, and effectiveness.”

lenght : 45 mn

Excecutive Production : Situation Comédie

A performance commissioned by The Pompidou Center and funded by Ministère de la Culture (DICREAM)

Libération (4/28/2017) - "It probaby is this artist's charming talent : knowing how to highlight the conventions without being heavy handed." Eve Beauvallet
Mouvement (3/2/2017) - "Comedy, a serious art. (interview)" Carole Bailly
Le Mouv’ (4/28/2015) - "A "mise en abîme" that hits the spot." Augustin Arrivé (not yet translated)
Theatrorama (4/18/2015) - "He shows with talent that feat of strength comes from defeating strength" Cathia Engelbach (not yet translated)

Date City Venue
15/01/18 - 16/01/18 Los Angeles, CA Human Resources
Time: 8:00pm. Address: 410 Cottage Home St, Los Angeles, CA 90012, USA.
14/10/17 Paris La Gaïté Lyrique
Time: 6:00pm. Age restrictions: All Ages.
19/01/17 - 20/01/17 Bordeaux Le Carré des Colonnes
Time: 8:30pm. Age restrictions: All Ages.
15/10/16 Nanterre Théâtre des Amandiers
Time: 7:00pm. Age restrictions: All Ages.
13/10/16 Chateau-Thierry L’Echangeur CDC
Time: 7:00pm. Age restrictions: All Ages.
11/06/16 Paris College des Bernardins
Time: 8:30pm. Age restrictions: All Ages. Address: 20 Rue de Poissy. Venue phone: 01 53 10 74 44.
03/06/16 Gennevilliers T2G
Time: 4:30pm. Age restrictions: All Ages.
29/01/16 Marseille festival Parallele
Time: 8:30pm. Age restrictions: All Ages.
02/07/15 - 03/07/15 Saint Etienne Festival des sept collines
Time: 5:00pm. Admission: gratuit. Age restrictions: All Ages.
17/04/15 - 19/04/15 Paris Pompidou Center
Time: 8:00pm. Address: Place Georges-Pompidou.
21/10/14 Grenoble Le Magasin
Time: 8:00pm.
12/06/14 Paris Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain
Time: 8:00pm.

faussebonneIdée.001

Season 1 Episode 2 is a movie that describes, step by step, its own making.

Part film, part theater, part reality television… Phoenix Atala’s Season 1 episode 2 examines its own production process step by step, as it is being created in front of the audience. The hilarious and thoughtful work questions the concepts of mass media, Big Brother, and the boundaries of reality and fiction—while offering a delightful critique of social norms and structures.

Known to New York audiences for his work with French performance group Grand Magasin, Phoenix Atala is a renoun and critically acclaimed  theatrical director in Europe who tries his hand at cinema.

For this production the cast, a  mix of french celebrities and amateurs, obsessively describe what’s happening on the screen.

The movie is an eye opening revelation for who is new to the mechanism behind cinema production, and an entertaining witty and playful UFO for who works in the industry.

As orange: Pascale Murtin, Christophe Salengro, Aurélia Petit
As pink:  Virginie Petit, Danièle Colomine, Pascale Murtin
As Yellow:  Joseph Dahan, Christophe Arrot, Danièle Colomine
As blue:  Marc Bruckert, Michel Phelippeau
As brown:  Etienne Charry, Virginie Petit, Pascale Murtin
As red:  Marc Bruckert, François Hiffler

Executive Producer GRAND MAGASIN/ 34567FILMS
Coproduction GRAND MAGASIN / 34567FILMS/Le Consortium, Dijon /
Dubbelspel (30cc & STUK Kunstencentrum) /
MAC/VAL, Vitry sur Seine / Les Spectacles vivants –
Centre Pompidou With the help of
Ministry of Culture and Communication (DICREAM)
With the support of Laboratoires d’Aubervilliers
and Canal + Short Program Unit

Date City Venue
06/11/11 Madrid Impresentable Festival
Address: La Casa Encendida/ 2 Ronda Valencia.
19/10/11 - 17/12/11 Hambourg, Lunebourg, Paris Channel TV
01/10/11 - 31/10/11 Jerusalem Show V
11/07/11 Vitry-sur-Seine MAC/VAL
Address: Place de la Liberation.
26/11/09 Paris La Menagerie de Verre
Address: 12/14 rue Lechevin.
27/09/09 - 28/09/08 Toulouse Printemps de Septembre
09/09/09 New York, NY Crossing the Line/FIAF
27/08/09 - 28/08/09 Groningen Noorderzon International Performing Arts Festival
Address: A-Kerkhof 12.
15/05/09 Rennes Festival Agitato
Address: Boulevard de Yougoslavie.
20/03/09 Creteil Festival International de film de femme
03/11/08 - 04/11/08 Leuven STUK Kunstencentrum
Address: Naamsestraat 96.
17/10/08 L’Isle en Dodon Pronomade
24/09/08 Bordeaux TNT
19/09/08 Quend Festival du Film Grolandais
29/05/08 - 30/05/08 Lausanne Arsenic
29/05/08 Paris Festival Hors Pistes/Centre Pompidou
24/05/08 Caen Cinema LUX
17/05/08 Vitry-sur-Seine MAC/VAL
Address: Place de la Liberation.
01/04/08 Champigny Sur Marne Conservatoire Olivier Messiaen
27/02/08 - 01/03/08 Bethune Comedie de Bethune
13/02/08 - 15/02/08 Paris Pompidou Center
Address: Place Georges-Pompidou.