Chapter 21 - An Interview with Magali Mougel

Summary

In conversation with her English translator Chris Campbell, playwright Magali Mougel broaches two main issues dominating theatre in France today. With regard to identity politics, she remarks that theatre-makers from communities that have historically been minoritized owing to gender, ethnicity, ‘race’ or other protected characteristics tend to prefer not only to write plays but also to direct and perform them in order to have control over the images portrayed and to ensure that discriminatory clichés do not creep back onstage. Mougel’s reflections transition from representation to the material conditions of theatre-making as she describes a sector beyond the main national theatres, which is increasingly underfunded and where burnout for the part of artists, technicians and administrators is a real concern.