Chronology:
1930-1990

«63 mises en scène, from 1966 to 1986, more than 15 authors translated, from Russian, from ancient and modern Greek, from Mikhaïl Boulgakov to Yanis Ritsos, without mentioning the teaching, the journals and theatres that he directed (Théâtre des quarties d'Ivry 1972-1981; Théâtre National de Chaillot 1981-1988; Administrator of the Comédie-Française 1988-1990), Vitez was a man pressed by time, "alone within myself" he would say» (article in La Matricule des Anges, number 21, november-december 1997).

«A born teacher, Vitez began  giving courses in Jacques Lecoq's theatre and mime school (1966-1970), then continued at the Conservatoire national d'art dramatique (1968-1981) where he developed his own personal pedagogical system according to which he destabilized the inherited traditions of the "grand" theatre school. He developed primarily a principle of exercise and variation based on specific texts. The latter served as  jumping-off points for improvisation. At the same time, he focussed on the re-establishement of a formal dimension for the diction of alexandrine verse, a dimension in which music assumes an important place. He wanted to avoid the dangers of so-called "natural" diction, and defended the notion of verse as a [necessary] poetic convention. In each of the theatres he directed..., Vitez set up schools, for they are, he claimed, "the most beautiful theatres of all"» (http://www.theatre-chaillot.fr/bioh/vite.htm).

At Ivry. Modern and classical playwrights. «a time when he declared that one could create theatre from everything. Starting from this position, he developed a type of theatre centred around the actor, postures and voice, [but] never respectful of the "naturalness" of the body. His brand of theatre derived from rupture and montage. He also initiated one of the trends of French theatre, the theatre-narrative, first in Catherine (1975), a spectacle inspired by Aragon's Les Cloches de Bâle. Simultaneously, Vitez worked on the classical repertory, first with Phèdre (1975)», next with his Molière tetralogy (1978), in which he sought openly to revalorize the alexandrine as code, as a formal artifice, as sonorous beauty, refusing its banalisation by means of associating it with everyday speech.» (http://www.theatre-chaillot.fr/bioh/vite.htm).

Great scenic successes at Chaillot:
Hamlet (1982)
Hippolyte, by Robert Garnier (1982)
Hernani and Lucrèce Borgia, by Victor Hugo (1985)
Le Soulier de satin, by Paul Claudel (1987)

The latter productions were achieved with the collaboration of Yannis Kokkos (scenography), Georges Aperghis (music), Patrice Trottier (lighting).  «a new, more tightly focussed esthetic, more articulated by the narrative (récit), inspired by an extreme concern for plasticity and equally attentive as previously to the language » (http://www.theatre-chaillot.fr/bioh/vite.htm).

His last production at the Comédie-Française:
La Vie de Galilée, by Brecht (1990)
 

Objectives:

While working in the contemporary register, he does «not exclude a re-reading of the classical repertory, those "sunken galleons", by putting forward the idea of its strangeness, of a necessary distance required to understand it.

Working not only through Chekov, Jarry, Maïakovski, Brecht, Tournier, Kalisky, but also through Sophocles, Racine and Molière, etc., Antoine Vitez left his mark in the way in which he treated dramatic texts, highlighting effects of rupture, montage and dissonance. He worked also on the diction of the alexandrine verse, seen as a formal resistance against common language, integrated voiced accents as a  form of alterity to a [given] language, had male actors play female roles and vice-versa» (article in La Matricule des Anges, number 21, november-december 1997).

Rather than following the aims of the popular theatre movement (Vilar, Planchon), Vitez adopted the objective of  raising one's sights. At Chaillot, he called for "an elitist theatre for all" ("un théâtre élitaire pour tous") instead of an "egalitarian theatre for all" (un théâtre égalitaire pour tous")
 
 

Theories on directing:
 
«He upheld the notion of distance from the classics which need to be viewed as "sunken galleons", as stange objects which have lost their familiarity. Staging them also involves the staging of the cracks in time; Vitez rebelled against all attempts at modernization, for theatre is "an art of the past" » (http://www.theatre-chaillot.fr/bioh/vite.htm).

A particular focus on voiced  rhythm
«Theoretical and practical research into ryhthm is occurring at the very moment of an epistemological rupture: after the imperialism of the visual, of an insistence on space, on the scenic sign within mise en scène taken as a visualization of meaning, a shift is taking place toward another paradigm of theatrical representation,  toward the auditory and  the temporal dimensions of the signifying sequence, that is to say rhythmic structuring..»
(Patrice Pavis, "Rythme" in Dictionnaire du théâtre) Vitez was an important influence in this regard.
 
The "montage"  approach: a displacement of the importance of the spoken or written text
«A first example is Vitez's adaptation of Aragon's Les Cloches de Bâle under the title of Catherine, elaborated and performed with his company, the Théâtre des Quartiers d'Ivry, in 1976, and subsequently televised by the O.R.T.F. Vitez believes in a productive tension between the material and its staging: "The theatre is someone who takes his material wherever he finds it--even things not made for the stage--and puts them on stage. Or, rather, stages them" (Miller, 1981: 432). "Theatre can be made from  anything... novels, poems, press cuttings, the Gospel" (Temkine, 1977: 197). Catherine consisted of eleven actors sitting down and having dinner around a table, going slowly through each of the  courses in French style, from the soup at the beginning to coffee and liqueurs at the end. The reading passed from one actor to another, with occasional movements when the readers took on some of the characteristics of Aragon's people. But it remained essentially a reading  of a novel, not a dramatisation in the usual sense. Vitez claimed that to stage a novel means not simply to put it into dialogue but to stage its narrative texture as well. He  took a similar approach to Pierre Guyotat's book Tombeau pour cinq cent mille soldats in 1981 at the Théâtre National de Chaillot. Guyotat's dense prose attempts to embody all the sordid horror and fascination of the Algerian War in the very texture of its words. Vitez presented chunks of Guyotat's prose intact, accompanied by images of torture, killing, rape, blood, excrement and sperm, not telling a story but presenting the raw experience of a twentieth century war. Through such adaptations, Vitez [...] creates for his audiences an experience of overlapping realities or time scales (e.g. both that of the actors' meal and that of the story of Catherine) drawing from the clashes between them a reflection on how we constitute and experience our own realities and our own stories.» (David Bradbury, Modern French Drama 1940-1990, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1991, p. 224-5)