Tinouche Nezamjoo

Tinouche Nezamjoo, director, writer and actress, was born on March 12, 1974 in Tehran. From 1991 to 2000, she staged several plays in France by playwrights such as Harold Pinter, Jean Tardieu, Eugène Ionesco, Anton Chekhov and Mohsen Yalfani in French. She has a degree from ESRA (École Supérieure de Réalisation Audiovisuelle) and graduated from Sorbonne Nouvelle, University of Paris III, majoring in Oriental Languages and Literature. In Iran, Nezamjoo started her career in the theatre in 2001 by translating and staging the plays of Matei Vișniec. She has translated and staged several plays in Iran, such as “The story of the Panda bears told by a Saxophonist”, “Three nights with Maddox”, “The spectator sentenced to death” and “The body of a woman as a batlefield in the war of Bosnia” (“ The playwrights whose works she has translated into Persian or into French include Samuel Becket, Agota Kristof, Jean Tardieu, Jon Fosse, Harold Pinter, Jean-Luc Lagarce, Bernard-Marie Koltès, Marguerite Duras, Eric Emmanuel Schmit, Bahram Beyzaei, Mohammad Yaghoubi, Mohammad Charmshir, Naghmeh Samini, Mohammad Rahmaniyan and Amirreza Kouhestani. Works During the course of her career in translation, Tinouche Nezamjoo has translated several plays and stories from Persian into French. Some of these plays have been staged in French by herself or by other renowned directors. Most of the books and plays that she has translated are available to the public though some of them have been translated for specific performances. Her works in translation mostly include plays and stories –a number of which are presented below.
“Dilapidated” is a story by Aboutorab Khosravi that Nezamjoo has translated into French. Khosravi’s work uses surrealist notions supported by qualities of a post-modern novel. His relative mastery over classical literature gives him a powerful yet mellow tone. In his work we see a peculiar language that tends to be archaic, archetypal and which leans a bit towards the language of the scriptures. Tinouche Nezamjoo staged “Dilapidated” in 2013 in Brussels. Nezamjoo’s major contribution to the world of art and literature revolves around drama translation. “Woman’s voice, blood’s voice” is a collaborative play writen by three major Iranian playwrights, Mohammad Charmshir, Mohsen Yalfani and Mohammad Rezaei Rad. Nezamjoo translated this play into French and it was published by Arpentages Publication House. She also directed a performance of this play for Arpentages Festival in 2011 in Grenoble, France. Another play that Nezamjoo has translated Tinouche Nezamjoo 46 Printed in IRAN is Naghmeh Samini’s “Horses of the sky rain ashes” (“Les chevaux du ciel tombent en pluie de poussière”).
Ney Publication House in Tehran has published this play in 2006 in both French and Persian. This play tells the story of Siyavash, a legendary figure in Persian mythology, and how he disappears into fire and then rises out of it. A play in 5 acts, it recounts how Siyavash rides through the fire that should prove his innocence and chastity and then the rest of what happens after his successful emersion from the fire is narrated by the other characters in the play. Nezamjoo won the translation award “DARC France” for two years in a row for two different plays, one entitled “Stronger than the night” (“Plus fort que la nuit”) by Mohsen Yalfani and the other one entitled “Winter 1987” (“Où étais-tu l’hiver 1987”) by Mohammad Yaghoubi. “Winter 1987” is a charming narration of one of the nights in the winter of 1987 (1366 Persian calendar). Yaghoubi gives us a unique account of the Iran-Iraq war in this play. The two plays, “Stronger than the night” and “A guest of a few days” (“Un invité de quelques jours”), both by Mohsen Yalfani, have been translated by Nezamjoo and published in France by Cheshmandaz Publication House in Paris.
Parts of Nezamjoo’s translations were originally intended for specific performances at universities. An example is “Interview” (“L’Entretien”) by Mohammad Rahmaniyan, Iranian writer and director. This play recounts the life of a man and a woman who are under treatment at a mental hospital after the Algerian Revolution. They have both fought against the French occupation force during the Algerian Revolution, have had brain injuries and suffer from mental disorder as a result. Nezamjoo has also translated “Seljuk station” (“La Station Seljukide”), a play by the famous Iranian director and playwright. Bahram Beyzaei is among the few Iranians who have had a stellar record in both cinema and the theatre. The play “Seljuk station” recounts the story of the contrasting views of a French couple that are both news reporters. Nezamjoo has translated this play for French director Tony Gatlif. Nezamjoo’s most recent translation into French is of “The yoke and the buterfly” (“Le Joug et le papillon”), a play by Mohammad Charmshir, famous Iranian playwright, which is based on Van Gogh leters. “The yoke and the buterfly” has been staged in 2006 in a collaborative work between directors, Arvand DashtAray and Fabrice Nicot and was performed in Paris and Tehran through the help of the National Institution for the Youth and the Arts in France. It is worth reminding that all the works mentioned above have been translated by Nezamjoo into French.