Odeon Theater, Paris

General

The Odéon theatre in Paris made history after it was inaugurated by Marie-Antoinette on April 9, 1782. The theater is located on the left bank of the Seine, and was built in order to house the Comédie Française. The King's actors were going to play in the first monument theatre in Paris, after over ten years of challenge between the parts interested in the development of the land owned by the Prince de Condé. This was the first theater with a proscenium arch where the audience in the stalls were seated on benches. In the following 300 years, the theater hosted important stage directors and plays from all around the world. In 1827 "Second Théâtre Français" -as it was named at the time- became the first theatre in France to present Shakespeare in English, put together by a British company.

But Odeon Theatre is so much more than a historic monument and the proof of living history. Today's theater intends is to bring change not into the community, but in the individual, not to the elite but to the minority, to the mortals that accepts to be part of this unique process of witnessing and being absorbed.

The Odeon theater in Paris was advanced to the title of "National Theatre", and is today one of France's six national theaters. In 1990, the theater was renamed Théâtre de l'Europe and became a member of the Union of the Theatres of Europe.