Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015 
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015 
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015 
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015 
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015 
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015 
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015 
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015
Photo: Pascal Gély, 2015 
 

Sœurs

by Wajdi Mouawad
inspired by Annick Bergeron and Nayla Mouawad
Direction: Wajdi Mouawad

F.I.N.D. #15
Guest Production by Au Carré de l’Hypoténuse France and Abé Carré Cé Carré Québec (France/Canada)

04/21/2015, 20.00–22.00
In French with German and English surtitles

Followed by Audience Talk

In Wajdi Mouawad's new play »Sœurs« an expert in ethnic conflicts and an insurance loss adjuster encounter each other in a wrecked hotel room: two ostensibly very different women, both played by actor Annick Bergeron. The first grew up as part of the French-speaking minority in anglophone Canada and opted for a career over family life. One night, alone, disenchanted with her apathetic students, exasperated by the English voice command system in her anonymous, fully-automated hotel room, she sees red. The second fled as a child with her father from the civil war in Lebanon and forged a life for herself in the West. She still cares for her traumatised father who constantly makes out that it is she who is dependent upon him. Both women discover they have much more in common than at first appears.
Annick Bergeron, who as an actor often works with Wajdi Mouawad, has observed the latter’s older sister Nayla for many years. She interviewed and filmed her and used these approaches as the basis for some improvised scenes of her own. This material formed the starting point for Mouawad's text which, with great sensitivity and a lightness of touch, explores the relationship between sisters of greatly varying dimensions: between two individuals, between different times and continents, between the secure Canada of the West and civil-war torn Lebanon.  

Wajdi Mouawad (*1968, Beirut) is a Canadian author, actor  and director. He studied acting at the École Nationale de Théâtre  du Canada. His best-known plays include »Incendies« (2003)  and »Temps« (2011). In 2005 he received the Prix Molière for  best  francophone  author.  In  2009  he  was  appointed  Artiste  Associé at the Festival d’Avignon, where his production »Femmes«  was invited in 2011. »Temps« was first shown during the F.I.N.D.  at the schaubühne in 2011. Mouawads novel »Anima« received  numerous awards, e. g. the Prix Meditéranée and the Prix Phénix  (2013). 

>>> Essay about the production in Pearson's Preview: »Sœurs«: A correspondence with Wajdi Mouawad

Duration: ca. 120 minutes

Co-production with Grand Théâtre de Loire-Atlantique, Théâtre National de Chaillot (Paris), Théâtre de l’Archipel scène nationale de Perpignan, Le Quartz scène nationale de Brest. Supported by Institut français and the French Ministry for Art and Culture/DGCA.