The French actress, Jeanne Moreau, has made a triumphant debut as a theatre director with a production in Lausanne of "Wit", by the American playwright, Margaret Edson.

The French actress, Jeanne Moreau, has made a triumphant debut as a theatre director with a production in Lausanne of "Wit", by the American playwright, Margaret Edson.

Moreau was greeted with a standing ovation when she took to the stage at the end of the first night's performance on Tuesday.

The main actress, Ludmila Mikhael, also received thunderous applause for her protrayal of a female academic - a specialist in the works of the English poet, John Donne - who is dying of cancer.

"Wit" is set in a hospital where the central character, played by Mikhael, is battling against her disease.

Moreau first saw the play in New York and on her return to Europe worked on a French adaptation of the text with Stéphane Laporte. In an interview with the Swiss weekly magazine L'Hebdo, she said the presence in the play of Donne was a "sublime" touch because like the dying professor he had led an extraordinary life.

The French adaptation of the Pulitzer prize-winning "Wit" is entitled "Un trait de l'esprit".It can be seen at Lausanne's Théatre de Vidy until May 14.

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