Anne Gilibert - Contre-courant

Anne Gilibert brings Contre-courant to Espace Gerson

At Espace Gerson, we are delighted to welcome Anne Gilibert with her new one-woman show, Contre-courant, an evening built for our intimate Lyonnais stage and its close, conversational acoustics. From the very first minutes, her humor moves against the tide of easy certainties, making brilliant use of our room’s proximity to draw the audience into her orbit—one glance, one pause, and an entire row is laughing before the punchline lands. She works in the best tradition of Espace Gerson stand-up: quick on her feet, observant, and disarmingly personal. In Contre-courant, she threads finely tuned bits about everyday paradoxes—career hustle, family soft spots, the tug-of-war between city speed and human time—into a narrative that feels both spontaneous and meticulously crafted. Expect fresh live moments and brand-new beats such as “Rhône-Saône Mode d’Emploi,” where she riffs on Lyon’s two rivers as a metaphor for clashing priorities, “La Réunion qui N’en Finit Pas,” a surgical take on modern office ritual, and “Silence Radio,” a quicksilver portrait of messages left on read. In our brick-walled space, these sketches gain extra warmth and bite; you can feel the current of laughter ripple from table to table.

Artistic momentum and what to expect on the night

Anne Gilibert arrives at Espace Gerson with real momentum, sharpening Contre-courant across a run of live dates and fresh writing sessions that have kept her comic voice nimble and uncompromising. Her recent on-stage creations—“Les Courants Contraires,” a playful manifesto for stubborn optimism; “Le Pont qui Parle,” a city-life fable that turns a walk across the bridge into a confessional; and “Mode Avion,” where digital detox collides with everyday anxieties—show how she transforms familiar situations into sparkling, unexpected angles. We program her here because our room rewards that level of detail: the little eyebrow lift before a callback; the brave, quiet beat that lets a line breathe; the sudden burst of energy that ricochets from the stage to the back row. On the night, expect a structure that feels fluid: short, precise observational slices that build toward longer stories, a handful of playful improvisations with the front rows, and a final run of callbacks that tie the evening together. Contre-courant is designed for audiences who enjoy comedy that can be bright and mischievous one minute, then tender and revealing the next—without ever losing pace.

Because Espace Gerson sits at the heart of Lyon’s live comedy rhythm, we pay special attention to how a show inhabits the room, and Contre-courant fits it like a custom suit. The staging is simple and elegant, putting Anne Gilibert’s voice, timing, and presence front and center; the lighting carves out a crisp silhouette that lets her pivot from razor-sharp punchline to sly aside in a heartbeat. Across the set, you’ll hear new crowd-pleasers like “Grands Soirs, Petits Gestes,” a salute to everyday courage, and “Manual for Going Against the Flow,” a playful checklist that gets upended by the audience in real time. It’s the kind of hour where you leave feeling seen, amused, and slightly braver—an effect amplified by the intimacy of our venue. We look forward to hosting an audience ready to be surprised, to laugh in waves, and to follow Anne Gilibert as she swims joyfully, and hilariously, contre-courant at Espace Gerson.