La Queue du diable

By Were-Were Liking

Direction: Bomou Mamadou
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Not very enchanting…
Bomou Mamdou’s rendition of La Queue du Diable by Were-Were Liking, which deploys the same aesthetic style that earnt Ki-Yi M’Bock its reputation, brings together actors and giant puppets whose « brand mark » is clearly visible.
The play is based on a witchcraft trial. A man, N’Guidjol, accuses his wife, N’Gonga, of having « eaten » their six children. The play, whose narrative structure is more cinematographic than theatrical, uses three flash-backs to take the spectator back in time in the characters’ pasts, far from the court where the trial takes place. The scenes alternate between the trial, and the playing out of the accounts made by the witnesses who come to the stand. The spectator is thus party to the metamorphoses N’Gonga undergoes depending on whether it is she who recounts what happened, or whether she is seen through the eyes of her husband, or by the Leader of the rites.
The stage direction plays on a double space. A small fort space at the back of the stage houses the court-house space. The Judge, public prosecutor, and attorney are large articulated puppets, whereas the characters who come to bear witness in the box are actors. At the front of the stage, alternatively, the memories the witnesses come to narrate are played out like visualizations. The show oscillates between the reality of the court « over-dramatized » by the fort and the puppets, and the subjectivity of the memories acted out in a realist, at times almost vaudeville style.
However, the success of this kind of set-up depends on the harmony of the transitions, and the quality of the linking effects, and it is precisely here that the show falls short. The kind of big human caterpillar, which it is not really clear what it is supposed to represent, and which above all acts as a screen for the actor to appear in each scene, slows the rhythm and spoils the magic. The whole lacks simplicity and zest. The blue lights and strobe effects add nothing to the evocation of death, and overload the ambiance with a demonstrative theatricality which makes the subject feel artificial, giving it a Punch and Judy effect. As for the allegoric hyenas and the owls in Were-Were Liking’s play, which represent the witchcraft that prowls and haunts a lost society, they unfortunately having nothing menacing about them here, reminding us more of big teddies than harpies.
Furthermore, despite the real monstrosity of the affair, which mixes crime, incest, and adultery, all that the spectator really retains is the ridiculized caricature and nastiness of a couple better suited to a Middle Age farce. The announced lyricism falls by the wayside, and the tragedy disappeared.


by Were-Were Liking
direction: Bomou Mamadou
« A lyrical drama for a tragedy »
by the Groupe Ki-Yi M’Bock with Adrienne Koutouan, Michel Gohou, Bomou Mamadou, Niamba Bacome, Honakamy Tapé, Boni Gnaoré, Ozoua Balé
La Queue du diable///Article N° : 5358

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