Blackmail – Faire chanter

Black Mail, Performance, les chantiers de Marie-José Mondzain, Théatre d’Aubervilliers


We imagine a tragi-comic fresco on a background of industry, in the sense of an activity of women and men, daily orchestrated, an activity that is given to others for the purpose of production. The industry is the Paris Opera, the House to administer. The main actors of BLACKMAIL- the Performers – have their reserved quarters out of sight, but, sometimes, they come out to be seen and express themselves. Whether the opera and its stage are in rehearsal, representation or at a standstill, has no influence on their relation to reality: it slips. More clearly, for the Performers of the economic fresco, the consciousness of being the real actors of the reality is so strong, that it transforms any event, action, object, in simple decoration, and any Being – whatever it is , though he does – in living decoration