YIRIMADJO

of BRIQUET Arnaud

FRANCE, 2001, 00:54:00

Production : ASIL PRODUCTIONS, Avec le soutien du CNC, C9 TV, PEGASE Productions
Genre : Documentary
Keyword : Africa, Cultural Identity, Relation, Theatre

Summary :
In december 1998, a film crew followed the theater company that was producing the play "A Hungry Hyena". In the small village of Yirimadjo, about ten miles away from Bamako, ten actors from Mali and two western stage directors, Marcela Pizarro from Quebec and Patrick Janvier from France, have all decided to work together on Massa Makan Diabaté's text. They exchanged their point of views, and their exercises in concentration, articulation, relaxing, trust and character creation developed a close relationship between them as the rehearsals progressed. But that creation also required constant adaptation from every individual, a respect of each culture's working methods and rhythms, a permanent effort to understand the "other" and an adjustment of one's vocabulary (the same word can have three different meanings in Mali, France and Canada). The encounter and the difficulties caused by the cultural diversity of the group progressively gave way to the collective challenge : being ready for the opening night of the show at the Festival of the Theatre of Reality in Bamako.

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