Amsterdam | Frascati
Wed 2 October, 19h00

Amsterdam | Frascati
Thu 3 October, 19h00

El Botinière – the name of a mythical cabaret in the centre of Tunis – is a performance by Tunisian choreographer Selim Ben Safia. In a sober setting, set to popular electro-oriental music, the performance highlights the hidden side of Tunisian nightlife where joy, sorrow, love, hate, desires and life are intertwined. A place steeped in lust and where those who dare not show themselves in broad daylight wander. Five dancers each tell their own story in which the sombre and the sublime intersect, arousing feelings of freedom but also suffering.

El Botinière is a metaphor for the toxic world of ‘patriarchal hypocritical Arab-Islamic society’ in which people cannot be who they want to be. El Botinière reveals the inside of the Cabaret: a sacred space steeped in lust where the ones wander who dare not show themselves in broad daylight.
As day dawns, El Botinière turns out its lights, as final witnesses to another story, that of the night. The last forced laughs, the last swear words, the last hugs. The masks come off.

‘Each character will take you on his nightlife journey through cabarets and inebriation, but also in a toxic and sordid world covered by a patriarchal and schizophrenic Arab-Muslim society.’ Selim Ben Safia

Previously at Castélorienne Montval-sur-Loire 2022, Centre Choréographique Nantes 2023, Danse sur les Routes Quebec 2024