STUDY GUIDE Forests - Tarragon Theatre

LUDIVINE
I don‟t know! “ I will never abandon you.” – this sentence tattooed on my back since the day I was born
failed to keep its promise, since I was abandoned.
GÉRARD
Did you know the zoo? How are the animals? And how are Jeanne and Marie?
LUDIVINE
Gérard, I don‟t know anything about myself. Neither my mother‟s name, nor my father‟s. And nobody ever
told me about a zoo. Are you really Gérard?
GÉRARD
Gérard the boy giraffe, son of Albert and Odette, Jérémie and Hélène‟s little brother, and like you, I wear
my name tattooed on my back.
Gérard shows her his bare back with the tattoo: “Gérard.”
DOUGLAS DUPONTEL
This is the genealogy of the Keller family: Alexandre Keller had a son: Albert. Albert had three children
with Odette Garine: twins, Hélène and Jérémie, and a son named Gérard. In 1874, Albert settled with his
family on an estate in the middle of the Ardennes forest. Loup, if Ludivine is a descendant of that family,
that means you are, too.
LUDIVINE
What are you going to do?
LOUP
Now what do we do?
GÉRARD
I have to go back to the zoo!
DOUGLAS DUPONTEL
Meet the notary who took care of the Keller family affairs.
GÉRARD
The giraffe and I are waiting for the rain. Jérémie and Hélène told me that the giraffe loves the rain and I
love it when the giraffe is happy.
Rain in 2006. Rain in 1943. Rain in 1874.
LOUP
Here comes the rain.