Un pantin merveilleux

Diderot’s idea of the actor as a feature of excess

Abstract

The Paradoxe sur le comédien describes the art of acting as an exercise of multiplicity. According to Diderot, the great actor must be at the same time nothing and everything. In his materialistic approach, acting is considered a work and a concrete experience, where the actor must find a balance between the grace of the marionette and the exaggeration of the ideal. In absence of any passion, this kind of actor should be self-controlled and detached in order to move the audience. Indeed, Diderot’s theory is very concerned with the relationship between the artist and the spectator, not only for a moral purpose, but in view of a layered aesthetic experience. It follows that a dialectic between measure and excess can be considered as an exceptional key to understanding Diderot’s conception of theatre, which can also surprisingly disclose some contemporary features.