Stadium
ORIGINAL TITLE: Stadium
ARTIST: Mohamed El Khatib
France, 2017 | 1h 50 min. | Parental Rating: 10+
SINOPSIS
Stadium is a tribute from El Khatib to his football-loving father. In this documentary theatre work, which discusses being together, he gathered fans of football club RC Lens, called “the best French fans”. They follow each other in personal statements which are gradually configured in an anthropological investigation of fans’ behaviour, usually associated with rivalries, violence, xenophobia and other forms of discrimination. Beyond stereotypes, complex values, social bonds and the importance of the football ritual unfold. The piece puts the theatre spectator face to face with that of the stadiums, examining what is an audience and what separates, besides the clothes, the two audiences.
HISTORY
Mohamed El Khatib is an actor, director and writer born in Orleans, France, in 1980. He is an associated artist at Théâtre de la Ville de Paris, at Centre Dramatique National de Tours – Théâtre Olympia and at Théâtre National de Bretagne – Centre Européen Théâtral et Chorégraphique. His work blends theatre with other disciplines, such as dance, visual arts, cinema and digital media, displaying different views on these relationships. In 2008, he was one of the founders of Zirlib collective, the result of a gathering of authors, actors, researchers, dancers, cameramen and musicians from different backgrounds. The group sees contemporary creation as an experience, a gesture in which the most demanding aesthetic dimension can be confronted day-to-day. The gathering is the outset of each creation. This is the second time of El Khatib at MITsp. In 2019, he presented the show Leaving with Beauty.
CRITIC
“True to the asserting concept of ready-made, El Khatib does not provide an answer. He reveals situations and protagonists without taking sides, choosing some reality cut-outs and placing them on stage. Live or in video, he brings raw testimonials, without any editing or artistic filter.”
“It’s not vital knowing football to enjoy Stadium: even those who don’t know the difference of a penalty from a goal kick are there, because technicalities are left aside. The show is above all the theatre of a community behind a flag: ‘Pride of being Lensois’. And this community is far from being solid: unlike the image we have of the fans, who we tend to consider a mass when we don’t go to stadiums, it unfolds on the set in all its diversity and becomes human, embodied by people who have never thought of meeting one day in a theatre and to whom Mohamed El Khatib offers the unique opportunity to show their true selves.”
