Teatro GRIOT
“Our bodies are no longer natural organisms but architectures, fictions. We could sense the place of Teatro Griot that night: the stage as a space of rehearse, of autobiographical experiments where truth remains untreatable, fugacious, emancipated. A space where we rehearse the gesture and lucid disobedience.”
Zia Soares
History
Teatro GRIOT is a company of actors who are focused on exploring themes that are relevant for the construction and questioning of contemporary Europe and and its reflection on theatrical discourse and aesthetics.
The work that the company develops arises from the tension between body and territory, collective memory and individual memory, collective imaginary and individual imaginary.
Teatro GRIOT operates in that space of intersection of geographical and symbolical territories as the neuralgic point of an artistic movement of counter-memory.
‘Theatre
Faz Escuros nos Olhos, directed by Rogério de Carvalho premiered in 2012 at Institut Français du Portugal. It received the 2013 VIDArte Award presented by the Secretary of State for Culture and the Sectretary of State for Parliamentary Affairs. The play was performed in Lisbon, Loures, Barreiro, Almada, Sesimbra, Vila Nova de Santo André and Coimbra in Portugal and Luanda in Angola.
Theatre Season of African Authors, with the collaboration of the Faculty of Humanities of the University of Lisbon, CPLP (Community of Portuguese Language Countries) Business Confederation and the Nigerian, Angolan and South African Embassies as well as the Angola Mission to CPLP in Portugal. It was part of the 2013-2014 Biennale and included:
A raça forte [The Strong Breed], by the Nigerian writer, Wole Soyinka, directed by Nuno M Cardoso. It premiered at the Teatro do Bairro, Lisbon, in 2013.
- A Geração da Utopia, based on the book of the same name by the Angolan writer Pepetela, adapted and directed by Guilherme Mendonça. It premiered at Cineteatro A Barraca, Lisbon, in 2014. The writer attended the premiere.
- As Confissões Verdadeiras de um Terrorista Albino [The True Confessions of an Albino Terrorist], based on the memoir of the South African writer, Breyten Breytenbach, adapted and directed by Rogério de Carvalho, coproduced by the Gulbenkian Next Future Programme. The writer came to its premiere at Teatro do Bairro, Lisbon, in 2014. It was staged again in 2015 at Cineteatro João Mota, Sesimbra, in Le Carreau du Temple, Paris (during the Festival Chantiers d’Europe, promoted by Théâtre de la Ville), in Teatro Municipal Rivoli, Porto, and in 2016, in Teatro Municipal Joaquim Benite, Almada.
The daily newspaper Público elected it the Best Play in 2014.
TEMPESTADE [The Tempest], based on William Shakespeare’s play, adapted and directed by Bruno Bravo premiered in 2015 in Teatro do Bairro, Lisbon and later the same year it was performed in Cineteatro João Mota, Sesimbra.
Ruínas [Ruined], a play by Lynn Nottage, directed by António Pires, co-produced by Teatro do Bairro/Ar de Filmes and São Luiz Teatro Municipal in collaboration with Teatro GRIOT, was presented in São Luiz Teatro Municipal and in Teatro do Bairro in 2016.
O lugar por onde a vaca passou based on “Prometheus” by Aeschylus and directed by João Fiadeiro was presented in Teatro do Bairro, Lisbon, in 2016.
LUMINOSO AFOGADO Al Berto and directed by Zia Soares, premiered at Teatro da Trindade in December, 2016. It was presented at the Auditório Fernando Pessa - Casa dos Direitos Sociais at Centro de Artes de Sines in 2017. It was part of the Festival Mindelact programme, Cape Verde, in 2018.
OS NEGROS by Jean Genet, directed by Rogério de Carvalho, co-produced by Teatro GRIOT and São Luiz Teatro Municipal premiered in 2017 in the Sala Luis Miguel Cintra in São Luiz Teatro Municipal and in 2018 at the Cineteatro Municipal de Matosinhos Constantino Nery.
Que Ainda Alguém Nos Invente by Ricardo P. Silva, directed by Paula Diogo, coproduced by Teatro GRIOT and Teatro Municipal do Porto premiered in 2018 at Teatro Municipal do Campo Alegre and was performed in Teatro do Bairro, Lisbon, in September 2018.
Posso saltar do meio da escuridão e morder a selection of texts directed by Rogério de Carvalho, premiered in 2018 at the Festival Mindelact, Cape Verde, at the same year was presented in Teatro do Bairro, Lisbon and in 2019 it was performed in Recreios da Amadora, Amadora and in Teatro da Cerca de São Bernardo, Coimbra.
‘Films
TEMPESTADES – Ensaio de um Ensaio is a documentary directed by Uli Decker. It premiered at the InShadow – Lisbon ScreenDance Festival in 2015. It was screened in 2016 in Casa dos Direitos Socias promoted by the Lisbon City Hall Social Rights department; Mostra Internacional de Teatro de Santo André; Arroios Film Festival, Lisbon; Polo Cultural Gaivotas| Boavista, Lisbon, as part of the “Lusco-Fusco” arts programme; Cineteatro João Mota, Sesimbra; “12 Months Film Festival”, Romania; “CINALFAMA, Lisbon International Film Award” (Honourable Mention); “Equality Filmfestival”, Kiev, Ukraine. In 2017 it was presented at the “Barcelona Planet Film Festival”, Spain, and the “Festival Internacional Filmes sobre Arte Portugal”.