There were many spectators in the Bétaille village hall on Saturday November 9 for the play proposed by the Rionet theater workshop, “At my age, I still hide to smoke”. For more than twenty years, Sylvie Bellet has hosted and directed these workshops and it was she, the director, who was in charge of this theatrical evening.
This piece written in 2009 by Rayhana, an Algerian exile, evokes the dark decade that Algeria went through between 1992 and 2002: a civil war with tens of thousands of dead, missing and exiled. A tragedy for this country. The first to be affected were women, directly affected in their daily lives, their freedom, their relationship with men and their place in society.
This tragicomedy brings together nine women of different ages and conditions in a hammam in Algiers, a space protected from the outside. In this intimacy, points of view intersect, speech is freed. Sexual life, forced marriage or not, etc., little by little the particular destinies of each of them are revealed through stories which have marked and shaped their flesh, gradually revealing the political, social and sexual violence of an Algeria in prey to corruption and poverty.
At the center, there is the question of wearing the veil, arranged marriages, the freedom of women, but also the behavior of men, of those who emigrate to France beardless and who return bearded.
A big congratulations to the nine actresses for their energy which they demonstrated throughout the evening and the strength of conviction which they shared with the public. Sylvie Bellet should also be congratulated for her effective direction which was able to deal with a difficult subject with a very appreciable and appreciated touch of humor.
France
