Pierre Constant

Pierre Constant was a French actor, acrobat and stage director whose career joined the circus arts to spoken theatre and, later, to major opera houses across Europe. Born in Toulouse on 6 September 1933, he inherited a love of opera from his father yet began as a company actor at the Grenier de Toulouse. He soon added juggling, tightrope walking and trapeze to his craft, becoming a complete theatrical athlete. Fernando Arrabal wrote the play Sur le fil for him. Constant died on the evening of 16 September 2026 in Sainte-Livrade-sur-Lot, a few days after his 93rd birthday.

In 1974 he founded the Centre dramatique de La Courneuve, which he directed until the early 1980s. Jean-Albert Cartier then entrusted him with early opera productions: Verdi's I Masnadieri and Puccini's Tosca in Nancy and at the Theatre du Chatelet, stagings whose personal approach stirred passionate debate among audiences and critics. An international breakthrough followed when Gerard Mortier invited him to stage Verdi's Simon Boccanegra at La Monnaie in Brussels with Jose Van Dam in the title role. Engagements followed at the Chatelet, Theatre des Champs-Elysees, Teatro de la Zarzuela in Madrid, the Athens concert hall, La Fenice in Venice and Opera Vlaanderen, mainly in French and Italian repertoire.

His Mozart and Da Ponte trilogy (The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni and Cosi fan tutte) for Jean-Claude Malgoire's Atelier lyrique de Tourcoing won the prize for best production of 1995 and was revived in many theatres. Alongside opera, Constant remained a sought-after actor, notably for Jean Genet's poem Le Funambule, written after the suicide of acrobat Abdallah Bentaga. He was still performing that solo at the Theatre de Poche-Montparnasse in April 2026. For his book Violon solo, on Genet and music, he received the Prix Pelleas. Near the end of his life he assigned rights for a troubadour oratorio text, written for his friend the mezzo-soprano Beatrice Uria-Monzon, to collaborator Gregory Voillemet and composer Othman Louati so the project could continue after both artists' deaths. Tributes in Le Monde, Diapason and Forum Opera remembered courage, generosity and enthusiasm as the marks of a rare man of the stage who kept walking the wire.