French analytic psychodrama

1. Introduction

Version followed: individual psychoanalytic psychodrama (psychodrame psychanalytique individuel) in the Paris Psychoanalytic Society line, as set out by Kestemberg and Jeammet (1981, 1983, 1987) and Jeammet (1996, 1999), building on Lebovici, Diatkine and Kestemberg (1958). The setting is one patient, a director (meneur de jeu) who does not play, and a group of co-therapist players. Anzieu's group analytic psychodrama is covered only as a variant, flagged where it differs. Lacanian variants (Delaroche, Dupeu) are mentioned but not followed.

This is a psychoanalytic technique, not a manualised protocol. No official treatment manual exists. The founders' texts give a setting, roles and a clinical stance, and practitioners learn mostly through supervised team work. Step-by-step instructions below are therefore partly [synthesis] and are labelled as such.

What it is: a variant of the analytic setting for patients who cannot use face-to-face or couch work. These include adolescents, borderline and narcissistic organisations, anorexia, massive inhibition, glib speech cut off from affect, and acting out [source: Jeammet, Corcos & Chabert 1998 abstract; Rabain et al. 2016]. Patient and co-therapists improvise short scenes under the "as if" rule. The director, who stays outside the play, cuts scenes and links what was played to the patient's associations and to the transference.

How change happens: the play gives a concrete, external figuration of internal objects and psychic agencies. Several players spread out (diffract) the transference, which keeps the object from becoming traumatic in its intensity. Defences are not removed but subverted: they keep their protective, narcissistic function while becoming flexible enough to let repressed material through [source: Jeammet, Corcos & Chabert 1998 abstract; Jeammet 1999]. The patient first sees and lives fantasy outside, in the play. This confrontation with their own fantasy productions is what lets interpretation take on meaning [source: Jeammet 1999].

2. Framework

The sources describe no formal phases with exit criteria. The structure below is the setting as described, with the arc of treatment as a [synthesis] of the case reports.

Team and room [source: Nantes presentation; Rabain et al. 2016; MDA Lebovici-technique page]

One patient. One director (meneur de jeu) who leads but does not take roles [source: Jeammet 1999; Nantes presentation].
Co-therapist players, ideally about 3 to 8, of mixed sex and mixed professions (psychologists, psychiatrists, nurses, educators, trainees) [source: Nantes presentation; MDA page].
Some services separate a talking space from a playing space in the room: talk is secondary process, play is the transitional area [source: Nantes presentation]. Things that happen outside the room are "hors cadre" (outside the setting) but are still material [source: Rabain et al. 2016].

Session format

Weekly. Reported lengths run from about 30 minutes [source: Nantes presentation] to 45 minutes [source: MDA page].
Inside a session: a talk between patient and director, then one or more short scenes (proposed, cast, played, cut), with talk between scenes. The session ends with the director's closing comment or interpretation, and the director walks the patient out [source: Rabain et al. 2016; Nantes presentation, which names warm-up, scene and sharing phases]. [uncertain] how many scenes a session holds; 1 to 3 is common practice and not confirmed in a primary text.
After the session, the team meets without the patient to work on countertransference [source: Rabain et al. 2016; Lebovici's stress on co-therapist countertransference, cited there].

Arc of treatment [synthesis from case reports]

Indication and preliminary consultations. Goal: decide if face-to-face therapy is impossible or blocked, and present psychodrama as a proposal. The 2009 Centre Alfred Binet volume frames this as a question: offered after a series of consultations, or within institutional care [source: Garboua & Leandri 2009 notice]. Move on once the patient agrees to try the setting.
Opening period. Goal: the patient learns the "as if", can propose scenes and tolerate the group's gaze. Scenes are often factual and close to reality, as in the patient who wanted "only real things" [source: Sauvêtre et al. 2017]. Sign of progress: scenes start to carry fantasy and affect, and the patient risks role changes.
Working period. Goal: transference diffracted across players, recurring conflicts played and replayed, interpretation possible. Typical length is 2 to 2.5 years weekly [source: Rabain et al. 2016; Sauvêtre et al. 2017], and up to ten years in severe psychosis [source: Chambon & Kecskeméti 2006].
Ending or transition. Criterion [synthesis]: free association can be sustained in words without the play, and the patient can tolerate a single object face to face. Often followed by individual psychotherapy. Jeammet (1999) also describes a temporary psychodrama phase inside a blocked analysis, after which the analysis resumes.

3. Guiding principles

The analytic frame is extended, not abandoned. Free association, transference, interpretation and abstention from the patient's real life all still apply [source: ARTCENA dictionary]. In practice, judge each move by whether it serves the analytic process, not catharsis or behavioural rehearsal.
The director does not play. Their absence from the scene gives their look and their words a symbolic, third-party weight [source: Jeammet 1999]. In practice, never step into a role, even when the scene stalls; propose, cut and interpret instead.
Pretend, not real ("as if"). Fiction suspends acting out, and the play is not a prize for acting [source: Jeammet 1999; Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. In practice, stop any real violence or sexualised touching at once.
Defences are subverted, not abolished. [source: Jeammet, Corcos & Chabert 1998 abstract] In practice, let the patient keep the defensive scene they propose (factual, banal, controlling), and loosen it from inside the play rather than confronting it.
Diffraction of the transference. Several players spread ambivalence and dilute the intensity of the object [source: Jeammet 1999; Nantes presentation; Rabain et al. 2016]. In practice, notice which player is cast in which role, and how that changes over time.
The setting figures the psychic apparatus. Players can stand for parental imagos, superego, id and ego; the director tends to carry a superego or ego-ideal function [source: Jeammet 1999; Jeammet 1996 title]. In practice, read the cast list as a map of the patient's inner world.
The patient proposes; the director may propose for them. [source: Nantes presentation; Jeammet 1999] In practice, wait for the patient's scene, but offer one when they are blocked, so that blankness does not turn into a persecuting silence.
Co-therapists play the unconscious; they do not interpret. They play the role as given, or with small deliberate shifts that bring in latent meaning [source: Nantes presentation]. In practice, players put affect and fantasy into the role but never comment on the patient outside the scene.
Interpretation comes through the director and through the play. Spoken interpretation is built into the play [source: ARTCENA]; the play itself can work like an interpretation by mirroring [source: ARTCENA]; not every theme needs interpreting [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. In practice, keep the director's words few, and tie them to what was just played.
Group countertransference is a tool. [source: Rabain et al. 2016, citing Lebovici] In practice, a debrief after every session is part of the setting, not optional.
Watch out for knowing too much about trauma. Detailed knowledge of real traumas can make countertransference block thinking [source: A. Anzieu, cited in Rabain et al. 2016]. In practice, do not stage the actual trauma as a reconstruction; let fantasy scenes approach it.
The patient's whole time in the setting counts. From the waiting room to the door is the session [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. In practice, waiting-room behaviour, lateness and corridor remarks are material to bring back.

4. Intervention inventory

Scope note: the techniques named in the sources are scene proposal by the patient or the director, casting, faithful or shifted play, role change or reversal, the double, repeated scenes, voice-off comments, putting the patient in the spectator position, the director's cut (scansion), interpretation, and team countertransference work [source: Jeammet 1999; Nantes presentation; Rabain et al. 2016; Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. The step sequences are [synthesis] built from those descriptions. All example wording is illustrative, not the founders' words.

4.1 Indication and the offer of psychodrama

Purpose / when: for a patient whose defences defeat classic psychotherapy: massive inhibition, speech cut off from affect, false self, denial, phobia of inner life, acting out, somatic complaints [source: Jeammet, Corcos & Chabert 1998 abstract]. Also for adolescents, borderline and prepsychotic states where a massive transference risks de-differentiation, and for blocked analyses [source: Jeammet 1999]. Other indications are anorexia, resistant OCD, and patients who drop out after about two sessions of ordinary therapy [source: Rabain et al. 2016].
Steps [synthesis]: (1) In one or more consultations, note how the face-to-face relationship fails: silence, flooding, flight, or empty talk. (2) Present psychodrama as a different way of thinking together, not as a demotion. (3) Explain the team, that the director does not play, the pretend rule and the weekly rhythm. (4) Agree on a trial period and on how parents or the institution are involved (minors). (5) Hold a team meeting before the first session.
Example language (illustrative): "Talking face to face with one person seems hard for you right now. There is another way: you meet a small team, and you play short scenes about whatever you want. I'll be there to think it through with you, but I won't play."
Watch for: a patient who hears the offer as rejection or as a sign of being "too ill"; contraindication when every psychic production is felt as persecutory [source: Rabain et al. 2016] (see section 5).

4.2 Stating the setting and rules

Purpose / when: at the first session, and later only when a rule is broken. Anzieu advised giving the no-violence rule only when it is broken, because stating it too early makes children anxious [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006].
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Introduce each co-therapist by first name. (2) Explain that the patient proposes scenes and picks who plays whom, and can play themselves or someone else. (3) State the pretend rule: everything is played "as if". (4) Explain that the director stops scenes and that you talk in between. (5) State confidentiality and that the team talks together after sessions.
Example language (illustrative): "Here we play pretend. You can invent a scene from your life, a dream, something you imagine. You choose who plays what. I'll stop the scene at some point and we'll talk about it."
Watch for: a patient who wants every rule settled in advance (control), or who tests the rules at once. Both are material, not just admin.

4.3 The talking time with the director

Purpose / when: the opening of each session and the times between scenes. It is the secondary-process space, separate from the play space [source: Nantes presentation; Rabain et al. 2016].
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Seat the patient with the director. Co-therapists stay present but silent. (2) Open with a neutral invitation. (3) Listen for a theme, an affect, or a recent event that could become a scene. (4) Do not let the talk turn into a full face-to-face session: the play is the main channel.
Example language (illustrative): "What's been on your mind this week?" / "What comes to you?"
Watch for: long factual reports used to avoid play; talk directed only at one favoured co-therapist (transference choice).

4.4 Eliciting the scene proposal (patient proposes)

Purpose / when: every scene by default. The patient suggests scenes from real life or from inner processes, played in the present tense [source: Nantes presentation]. With children: a story from their life, a book or a dream [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006].
Steps: (1) Ask what the patient would like to play. (2) Ask where, when and who is there. (3) Have the patient sketch the opening moment only, not the whole plot. (4) Accept banal or defensive scenes: the defence is played, not removed [source: Jeammet, Corcos & Chabert 1998]. (5) Allow the patient to add or remove elements during play [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006].
Example language (illustrative): "What shall we play?" / "Where are we? Who's there? How does it start?"
Watch for: progress shows in scenes moving from strict reality to fantasy, dream or animal and object roles [source: Nantes presentation; Sauvêtre et al. 2017].

4.5 Director-proposed scene

Purpose / when: when the patient is blocked. The director can propose a scene in place of the patient [source: Jeammet 1999]. Also to pick up a theme from earlier sessions, or to move a factual account into the imaginary register [source: Sauvêtre et al. 2017].
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Wait a while, without letting the silence become persecuting. (2) Propose a scene built on a word, image or affect the patient just brought. (3) Leave the patient free to accept, change or refuse it. (4) Let the patient cast it if possible.
Example language (illustrative): "You mentioned feeling like you were in a prison when you see your mother. What if we play a prison visiting room?" (A scene of this kind is reported in Rabain et al. 2016.)
Watch for: the director's own countertransference driving the theme (check it in the debrief); compliant acceptance with no investment.

4.6 Casting

Purpose / when: after the scene is proposed. The patient assigns all roles. Roles can be people, animals or objects [source: Nantes presentation]. Each player can accept or refuse a role [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006, group variant].
Steps: (1) Ask what role the patient takes. (2) Ask who plays each other character. (3) Ask for one or two words about each character's attitude. (4) Note the casting in the session record (who is cast as whom over time).
Example language (illustrative): "Who are you in this scene? And who plays your father? What is he like?"
Watch for: the same player always cast as the bad object, or never chosen. This is diffracted transference to work with, in the debrief and through interpretation [source: Jeammet 1999; Rabain et al. 2016].

4.7 Co-therapist play: faithful and shifted

Purpose / when: throughout every scene. Players either keep to the role as the patient described it, or add small discrepancies to provoke a reaction and bring the latent theme into the play [source: Nantes presentation]. They give voice to representations and fantasies, and can speak in the patient's place [source: Jeammet 1999].
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Start close to the patient's brief, so the patient feels recognised. (2) Listen for the latent meaning: the affect the patient avoids, or the wish behind the complaint. (3) Add one shift at a time: a feeling named aloud, a slight exaggeration, an unexpected wish, a softer or harsher tone. (4) Stay inside the role. Never step out to comment or interpret [source: Nantes presentation]. (5) Leave the cut to the director.
Example language (illustrative, player as a parent in a homework scene): "I'm checking your marks again because, honestly, I'm scared you'll leave me behind."
Watch for: a shift that is too big (the patient freezes or quits the scene) versus too timid (the scene repeats with nothing new). It is working when the patient answers the shift with affect, or changes their own line.

4.8 Patient playing self, another, or an object

Purpose / when: the patient can play themselves, another person, an animal or an object [source: Nantes presentation; Sauvêtre et al. 2017]. Taking roles other than oneself lets disowned parts be lived at a distance.
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Let the patient choose freely at first. (2) Note how roles chosen over sessions change (for example, always the victim, never the aggressor). (3) When fitting, the director can suggest a different role in a later scene on the same theme.
Example language (illustrative): "This time, would you like to be the guard rather than the prisoner?"
Watch for: in Anzieu's group variant, a child who takes a different role in later sessions on a similar theme; that shift is what gets analysed [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006].

4.9 Role change and role reversal

Purpose / when: the director can change roles mid-scene so the patient experiences another protagonist's point of view [source: Nantes presentation; Rabain et al. 2016]. In Anzieu's child model, reversal must be the child's free choice, not imposed [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. [uncertain] how far the Kestemberg-Jeammet line imposes reversals; the sources show the director proposing them (Rabain et al. 2016).
Steps: (1) Cut the scene at a charged moment. (2) Propose the exchange: the patient takes the other character, and a player takes the patient's former role. (3) Restart from the same moment, or a moment just before it. (4) Afterwards, ask briefly what it was like on the other side.
Example language (illustrative): "Let's stop there. Would you swap and be the prisoner's mother? Marc will be the guard."
Watch for: the patient's stance in the new role. In Rabain et al. (2016), the patient's hesitation between formal and informal address and her aggression in the reversed role were read as material. It is working when the patient discovers an affect from the other side.

4.10 The double

Purpose / when: a co-therapist plays alongside the patient as the patient, or as one part of the patient [source: Jeammet 1999 lists it among the techniques; Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. Anzieu describes two functions: protection and approval (thinks and acts like the patient), or scapegoat (carries the patient's negative aspects). In the analytic model the double is an unforced phenomenon, not a technique run by the director as in Moreno [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. The patient can choose a double [source: Sauvêtre et al. 2017]. Further reading (not drawn on): Prudent (1996), "Les doubles au psychodrame analytique" [uncertain].
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Offer the double, or accept it when the patient asks for one, especially when the patient is mute or flooded. (2) The double stands near the patient and voices what the patient may feel or think but does not say, in the first person. (3) The patient can take up, correct or reject what the double says. (4) Do not force the double's words onto the patient.
Example language (illustrative, double speaking): "I'm smiling, but I'd really like to walk out."
Watch for: a double who becomes an interpreter (too knowing, too far ahead). It is working when the patient picks up the double's line in their own words, or argues with it.

4.11 Placing the patient as spectator

Purpose / when: named by Jeammet (1999) as a technique. Inhibited children can also watch first [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. Use it when the patient cannot play a role, or to give distance from a scene that is too exciting.
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Propose that players act the patient's scene while the patient watches beside the director. (2) A player can take the patient's role. (3) Cut, and ask what the patient saw or felt.
Example language (illustrative): "How about you watch this one with me, and Claire plays you?"
Watch for: relief and spontaneous corrections ("No, I'd never say that") mean it is working. Persistent watching only can become an avoidance pattern.

4.12 Repeated or replayed scenes

Purpose / when: the director can ask for a scene to be replayed differently [source: Nantes presentation]; Jeammet (1999) lists repeated scenes. Use it to work through, or to let a variant appear.
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Replay the same scene with one change: a different role, different player, different tone, or an earlier moment. (2) Or come back to a theme the patient replays across weeks, and note what changes.
Example language (illustrative): "Let's play it again, but this time your father arrives earlier."
Watch for: strict repetition with no change suggests compulsion to repeat. Name it, rather than replaying it again.

4.13 Voice-off comments

Purpose / when: Jeammet (1999) lists voice-off commentary ("comentarios en voz en off" in the Spanish translation). [uncertain] who gives it and exactly how is not detailed in the text.
Steps [synthesis]: a player, or the director from outside the scene, briefly voices an inner thought or a narrator line without stopping the action, then the scene continues.
Example language (illustrative): "(off) And at this moment, nobody notices that she is about to cry."
Watch for: use it sparingly. It must not turn into running interpretation.

4.14 The cut (scansion)

Purpose / when: the director interrupts the scene when a theme becomes charged [source: Sauvêtre et al. 2017; Rabain et al. 2016]. Also when real violence or sexualised touching occurs [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. The cut marks something, opens associations, and protects against overflow.
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Cut on the emergent moment (a slip, a sudden affect, a new element), not at the scene's natural end. (2) Use a short clear word. (3) Everyone leaves their role; the patient returns to the talking space. (4) Ask for associations, or propose the next scene or a role change (an "inter-jeu" pause [source: Rabain et al. 2016]).
Example language (illustrative): "Let's stop here." / "Something happened there. What came to you?"
Watch for: cuts that are too late (the patient is flooded) or too early (nothing has emerged). A good cut leaves the patient surprised but able to think.

4.15 Director's interventions and interpretation

Purpose / when: between scenes and at session end. The director picks up ambiguities in the patient's words, such as the double meaning of "revenant" (one who returns / ghost), and asks questions that open associations [source: Sauvêtre et al. 2017]. The director may offer a binary choice inside the play, for example what crime the prisoner committed [source: Rabain et al. 2016]. Confronting the patient with their own fantasy productions is what gives interpretation meaning [source: Jeammet 1999]. A theme does not always need interpreting [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006].
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Link something played to something said, in one or two sentences. (2) Interpret close to the surface and close to the play. Transference to a player can be named through the play ("the guard") before naming it directly. (3) Leave the patient room to answer. Do not hammer the point. (4) At the end of the session, a brief closing comment, then the director walks the patient out [source: Rabain et al. 2016].
Example language (illustrative): "The guard was very strict about not letting the child hug her mother. I wonder if part of you feels you're not allowed either." (paraphrasing the kind of comment reported in Rabain et al. 2016)
Watch for: intellectual agreement with no affect means too far from the play. It is working when the next scene or session brings new material on the same theme.

4.16 Team countertransference work (post-session)

Purpose / when: after every session. Lebovici stressed the co-therapists' countertransference in conducting psychodrama [source: Rabain et al. 2016]. The team works as a shared thinking apparatus [source: Rabain et al. 2016].
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Meet right after the session, without the patient, for 15 to 30 minutes. (2) Each player says what they felt in their role, not only what they did. (3) Map who was cast as whom and why. (4) Identify any player who acted out of countertransference. (5) The director notes themes to watch for next week.
Example language (illustrative, player in debrief): "Playing the mother I felt shut out and angry, and I went harder at her than I meant to."
Watch for: splits in the team that mirror the patient's splitting; a player who keeps "forgetting" the patient.

4.17 Termination or transition

Purpose / when: [synthesis] when the patient associates freely in words, the play has become less necessary, and a single face-to-face object no longer threatens. Jeammet (1999) also describes using psychodrama temporarily within a blocked analysis.
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Raise the ending months in advance. (2) Play scenes on separation if the patient proposes them. (3) Agree on the next step (individual therapy, analysis, or stopping). (4) Hold the final session in the usual format.
Example language (illustrative): "We've been playing together for two years. I'm thinking it may soon be time to just talk, one to one. What do you think?"
Watch for: a sudden regression as the end approaches; work through it rather than prolonging the treatment by reflex.

4.18 Variant: Anzieu's group analytic psychodrama

Purpose / when: group setting, for children, adolescents or adults (Anzieu 1956). Several patients, therapists who play and may put interpretations into the play during the scene [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006].
Key differences [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]: a neutral room with no stage and no audience; patients propose stories and one is chosen to play; each participant may accept or refuse a role and may leave a scene; less emphasis on Moreno's warm-up and group sharing; members should not be a real-life group (family, class).
Watch for: the group dynamic itself must also be thought about, not only the play [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006].

5. Handling problems

The sources give the principles (subvert defences, diffract transference, use the director's proposal, cut on overflow). Most of the concrete responses below are [synthesis] and are marked.

Patient cannot propose a scene (blankness, "I don't know"). The director proposes a scene [source: Jeammet 1999]. Build it from the patient's last word or image (4.5). Or offer the spectator position (4.11) [source: Jeammet 1999; Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. [synthesis] Do not leave long silences: for these patients, silence is felt as the object's absence or as a persecuting gaze.
Only factual, "real" scenes, no fantasy. Accept them; the defence is played, not removed [source: Jeammet, Corcos & Chabert 1998]. Players add small affective shifts (4.7). The director can propose a scene that shifts into the imaginary register [source: Sauvêtre et al. 2017].
Glib play: the patient performs, with no affect. [synthesis] Cut sooner. Have a double voice the missing affect (4.10). Interpret the performance itself through the play ("the actor who must never miss a line").
Overwhelm, flooding, panic in the scene. Cut at once (4.14) [source: Sauvêtre et al. 2017]. [synthesis] Return to the talking space. Lower intensity: spectator position, a double for protection (Anzieu's protective function), or a less charged scene. Discuss in the debrief whether a player's shift was too strong.
Real violence or sexualised touching. Stop the play immediately [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. State the pretend rule at that point. [synthesis] Name the act as material in the next talking time, not as a punishment; review the safety of the room and the team.
Acting out outside the setting (absences, lateness, scenes in the waiting room). The session runs from waiting room to door [source: Anzieu via Gabbour 2006]. Events "hors cadre" are material [source: Rabain et al. 2016]. [synthesis] Bring the event back as a scene proposal: "Shall we play the waiting room?"
Non-attendance and drop-out. [synthesis] Contact the patient in a way agreed at the start (and the parents for minors). Keep the slot open for a fixed period. When the patient returns, offer a scene about not coming. For minors, the parental contract is part of the setting; in one case the father paid and was responsible for the work [source: Sauvêtre et al. 2017].
Massive transference onto one player (idealised or hated). This is the risk the setting is built to dilute [source: Jeammet 1999]. [synthesis] The director gradually casts or proposes other players in related roles; interpret the choice through the play; handle the player's countertransference in the debrief.
Negative transference onto the director (as superego). Jeammet (1999) gives the director a superego or ego-ideal function. [synthesis] Expect it, and name it carefully; you can let the patient cast a judge or a teacher and play out the rebellion against them.
Rupture: the patient walks out, or attacks the setting or team. [synthesis] Do not chase into the corridor with a player. The director alone sets the limits and, if possible, says a closing sentence. Next session, name the rupture in the talking time before any scene. Review in the team what triggered it.
Team problems (splits, rivalry, a player acting out). Use the post-session work [source: Rabain et al. 2016, citing Lebovici]. [synthesis] Rotate who speaks first in debriefs; get external supervision when the team mirrors the patient's splitting; replace a player only after thinking through what that change means to the patient.
Knowing too much about a real trauma. Countertransference can block thinking [source: A. Anzieu cited in Rabain et al. 2016]. [synthesis] Do not stage the actual abuse as a reconstruction; let fantasy scenes approach it, and the director chooses when to make the link.
Persecutory response to any psychic production. Reported as making the approach hard to use [source: Rabain et al. 2016]. [synthesis] Lower the bar to very brief scenes and frequent cuts, and reconsider the indication. Sometimes institutional holding must come first.
Adolescents. Jeammet's setting is especially used for adolescents, for whom the relationship to the object is a threat to narcissistic continuity [source: Jeammet 1999; Jeammet, Corcos & Chabert 1998]. [synthesis] Keep player ages and sexes varied; avoid a cast that feels like a family council; keep information to parents to the agreed frame.
Eating disorders (anorexia). Psychodrama is used to help move from behaviour to recognising denied conflicts [source: Rabain et al. 2016]. [synthesis] The body is in play: do not stage eating or weight, and do not comment on the body. Expect a strong wish to control the scene and the cast, and play the control rather than fighting it. Medical monitoring stays with the somatic team. [uncertain] Kestemberg's anorexia work (Kestemberg, Kestemberg & Decobert 1972, La faim et le corps) is not drawn on.
Suicidal ideation or risk appearing in a scene. [synthesis] Cut, leave the play, and do a standard clinical risk assessment in the talking time, or immediately afterwards with the responsible clinician. Follow institutional procedures. The play does not replace risk management.

Sources

Sources

Further reading (not drawn on) [uncertain where used beyond the summaries above]

Lebovici, S., Diatkine, R., Kestemberg, E. (1958). Bilan de dix ans de thérapeutique par le psychodrame chez l'enfant et l'adolescent. Psychiatrie de l'enfant, 1.
Diatkine, R., Kestemberg, E., Lebovici, S. (1952). Application de la psychanalyse à la psychothérapie de groupe et à la psychothérapie dramatique en France. L'Évolution psychiatrique, 3.
Kestemberg, E., Jeammet, P. (1981). Le psychodrame analytique : technique, spécificité, indications. Psychothérapies, 1(2).
Kestemberg, E., Jeammet, P. (1983). Le psychodrame psychanalytique à l'adolescence. Adolescence, 1(1).
Kestemberg, E., Jeammet, P. (1987). Le psychodrame psychanalytique. Paris: PUF (Que sais-je ?).
Jeammet, P. (1996/1998). L'espace thérapeutique comme moyen de figuration de l'appareil psychique : l'exemple du psychodrame psychanalytique individuel. Paris: ETAP.
Anzieu, D. (1956). Le psychodrame analytique chez l'enfant (reissued as …chez l'enfant et l'adolescent, PUF, 1994).
Amar, N., Bayle, G., Salem, I. (1988). Formation au psychodrame analytique. Paris: Dunod.
Prudent, A. (1996/1998). Les doubles au psychodrame analytique. Cahiers de psychologie clinique, 11.
Delaroche, P. (1996). Le psychodrame psychanalytique individuel. Paris: Denoël (Lacanian variant).
Kestemberg, E., Kestemberg, J., Decobert, S. (1972). La faim et le corps. Paris: PUF.

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