Pauline Bayle
Playwright and Director
I aspire to immerse myself in contemporary Indian culture, particularly to understand the ways in which it continues to engage with the Mahabharata—literally, theatrically, and politically. I hope the various encounters that will take place during this residency will allow me to explore a multiplicity of perspectives on this ancient and foundational epic, and will further enrich the intimate connection I feel with it.
Director, playwright, and actress Pauline Bayle has been the Artistic Director of the Théâtre Public de Montreuil since January 1, 2022. Trained at the Conservatoire National Supérieur d’Art Dramatique, she founded her company in 2011, naming it after her first play, À Tire-d’aile. Driven by an insatiable belief in the power of fiction, Pauline Bayle brings major literary works to the stage, including Iliad (2015) and Odyssey (2017), after Homer. In 2020, she adapted Balzac’s Lost Illusions, which won the Grand Prize of the Syndicat de la Critique in 2022. She continues to explore coming-of-age narratives, drawing from the work of Virginia Woolf with Writing Her Life, a production created in June 2023 at the CDN in Béthune and later presented at the Avignon Festival that same year. In September 2026, Pauline Bayle will premiere her next production, an adaptation of the great Indian epic, The Mahabharata.
