La Tendresse de Julie Berès au Théâtre de la Concorde

How does one become a man? Or, more precisely: how does one become a man without being confined by the models of masculinity, domination and performance that continue to structure our imaginations? With La Tendresse, Julie Berès opens a space on stage and in speech where young men tell their stories, move through and unsettle the injunctions of masculinity.

Built on spoken word, intimate experiences and a performative, choreographic devised-theatre approach, the show combines direct address, storytelling, dance and collective energy to give voice to life stories shaped by the contradictions of our era.

Family, sexuality, inheritance, violence, desire, vulnerability: these sensitive areas are explored here without didacticism, but with intensity, humour and frankness. On stage, the bodies speak as much as the words. The group becomes chorus, confrontation, support, self-exposure.

Within this movement, La Tendresse does not seek to offer a definition of « l'homme d'aujourd'hui  », but to open up cracks: towards other ways of inhabiting one's place, of loving, of connecting with others, of escaping the archetypes that have shaped our imaginations.

Far from caricature, Julie Berès creates a vibrant, political and deeply sensitive piece, which questions less a fixed identity than a possibility of transformation.

A way of shifting the lines of patriarchy, and of making the stage a place of questioning and reinvention, one that fuels hope.