SCREENING IN THE BERNARD OSHER FOUNDATION AUDITORIUM
“A powerful, passionate one-woman show... Wiseman restores the single voice of a single historical character and, in the process, renders her symbolic, emblematic, iconic.”
63 minutes. Not Rated. Directed by Frederick Wiseman. In French with English subtitles.
A Couple is a film about a long-term relationship between a man and a woman. The man is Leo Tolstoy. The woman is his wife, Sophia.
They were married for 36 years, had 13 children, nine of whom survived. Each kept a diary. Although they lived together, in the same house, they wrote letters frequently to each other. The Tolstoys were also a dysfunctional couple, arguing frequently and being very unhappy with each other while occasionally enjoying passionate moments of reconciliation.
The film is Sophia’s monologue about the joys and struggles of their life together, loosely drawn from their letters to each other and their diary entries. The film was shot in a beautiful garden on Belle Ile, an island off the coast of Brittany.