
Pierre Gendronneau '12, former Sciences-Po Paris exchange student and Co-Founder of Seuls en Scène, Princeton French Theater Festival, was named Deputy Director of the Avignon Festival (in February 2023) by Rima Abdul-Malak, Minister of Culture.
While at Princeton University, Gendronneau took classes in the Department of French and Italian and the Program in Theater, actively participating in co-curricular theater across campus. He designed lighting for a few student productions and was a member of L'Avant-Scène, the French Theater Workshop. With L’Avant Scène, he acted in "L'Avare" by Molière (2009) and "L'Échange" by Paul Claudel (2010), as well as designed lighting for "L'Illusion Comique" by Corneille, for which he earned a Princeton Tony Award.
After graduating from the Institut d'Études Politiques de Paris in 2012, Gendronneau returned to Princeton to help found, organize and administer Seuls en Scène, working with its Director, Florent Masse, and closely following its early trajectory. The partnership evolved in 2016 when Gendronneau became Director of Productions at Festival d'Automne in Paris. Starting in 2019, Seuls en Scène began collaborating with Festival d'Automne to bring small-scale productions from the Festival to Princeton.
In Avignon, Pierre Gendronneau will work alongside the Festival Director, Tiago Rodrigues, who took over last year. The first edition of this new era will take place this summer from July 5 to July 25, 2023, in Avignon, France.