CYCLING WITH MOLIERE

Using the work of 15th century playwright Moliere to examine a prickly friendship in modern day France – come on, we’ve all done it! – director Phillipe Le Guay straddles a line between pretension and accessibility with this amiable if forgettable comedy.
Gauthier (Lambert Wilson, Of Gods And Men) is the slightly smarmy lead actor in a ridiculous soap opera about a plastic surgeon who “saves lives”. Searching for a challenge and some meaning in life, he visits his old friend Serge (Fabrice Luchini), a superb actor whose lack of success has transformed him into a curmudgeon. As Hauthier tries to convince Serge to perform in his production of Moliere’s The Misanthrope, the story trips between questions of ego, artistry, friendship, rivalry and love – often neatly captured by Moliere’s scalpel-sharp script.
Wilson and Luchini (a real Moliere scholar) perfectly evoke the artistic frisson and personal barbs that spark between actors with their own issues. Their rehearsal scenes, elevated by Moliere’s keen observations on tumultuous friendships, become a battle of wits, with a chasm of understanding between their traditional and modern thespian styles.
Le Guay seems wary of alienating audiences with his wordy examination of how art imitates life, however, and Cycling With Moliere takes a few ill-advised forays into slapstick that jar. These scenes are short and clumsily edited, making them feel like afterthoughts.  This descent into broad comedy becomes somewhat ironic as the two leads discuss Moliere’s insistence on integrity and high thought in art. “Esteem must have some preference… the friend of man’s no friend to me,” is just one of the too-clever lines that falls flat.