Embroidery presents a gathering of six Arab women during a traditional tea session. As they share intimate conversations about life, they reveal their dreams, losses, and achievements. The performance invites the audience into an Arab home to listen to stories that reflect the challenges of love and life in a society caught between tradition and modernity.
Inspired by Marjane Satrapi’s book of the same name, Embroidery is built upon real testimonies collected from the hundreds of interviews featured in the documentary 7 Billion Others by French filmmaker Yann Arthus-Bertrand. Traveling the world, the documentarian sought to answer the question: What makes us human? Amok approaches the same question through theater, but from the perspective and lived experience of women.
The play encourages a shift in perspective, allowing us to hear the voices of women from another cultural background—voices that, despite their different origins, feel deeply familiar. Embroidery weaves together tears and laughter, stitching a thread that embodies the strength of each woman.
"When I close my eyes, I can still see the faces of those women embroidered on the walls of my eyelids—their laughter, their shared tears. I hold this memory as the very essence of the word “saudade" (Longing)
CAST AND CREATIVE
Direction: Ana Teixeira and Stephane Brodt
Cast:
- Fathmeh: Carmen Frenzel
- Massarat: Flávia Lopes
- Hiba: Jacyam Castilho
- Khadija: Sandra Alencar
- Nesrine: Vanessa Dias
- Walla: Vania Santos
Text: Ana Teixeira
Lighting: Renato Machado
Assistant Directors: Gustavo Damasceno
Set Design, Costumes, and Musical Direction: Stephane Brodt
Off-stage Music: Rudá Brauns (composition and performance)
On-stage Music: Vanessa Dias (composition)
Sound Editing: Gabriel Petit
Scenic Technician: Beto de Almeida
Seamstress: Ateliê das Meninas
Executive Production: Gabriel Garcia and Lucas Petidemange
Production Management: Amok Teatro and Sonia Dantas
PRESS
REVIEW
It is in Amok's customary artisanal care for the scenic space and its components that the play delivers a lesson in mastery through its elegance and refined taste. Ana Teixeira and Stephane Brodt spared no effort, drawing from their well-established theatrical expertise to shift the action—with a noticeable narrative emphasis—toward a sensory immersion in the realistic staging of an Arab household interior.
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Escrituras Cênicas (2022)
REVIEW
Bordados is a performance of listening. The language of the staging, the overall result—encompassing costumes, set design, lighting, and sound—transports us to another atmosphere, another rhythm. Everything is ritual. Every exclamation is sacred, just like the craft of the artist, who carries us far from ourselves while we are all in communion, sharing the joy of witnessing a clean, rigorous, and profoundly intense performance.
Pedro Alonso
Olhar Crítico (2022)
REVIEW
Bordados features an irresistible ensemble of six talented actresses who alternate between monologues and dialogues in an attempt to construct a broad and multifaceted universe of questions and answers that most faithfully reflect the reality of women in the Islamic world. A must-see performance that enlightens and moves audiences.
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Teatro Hoje (2022)
REVIEW
Based on a triple conceptual foundation—textual language, an intimate familial atmosphere, and the psychophysical expression of Arab female power—the sensory aesthetics of Bordados were carefully crafted. The profoundly moving testimonies, marked by raw sincerity and confessional tones, come to life through six actresses who fully commit themselves to the portrayal of their characters.
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Escrituras Cênicas (2022)
REVIEW
In just one hour and fifteen minutes, Eastern culture is revived and presented with stunning beauty. The set is richly detailed, featuring Persian rugs, intricately carved chairs, exquisite and refined tea sets, and Moroccan-style floor lamps—every element beautifully transports the audience to another continent. The cast can be compared to a garden of the most exquisite tulips. The costumes are breathtaking—flawless in execution, without a single misstep from the creators.
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Portal (2012)
REVIEW
On stage, six outstanding actresses perform with the utmost skill, all at the same level of excellence, setting the tone of the conversations and guiding the flow of the dialogue. In addition to shaping the text, Ana Teixeira and Stephane Brodt also direct the production, doing so with the same mastery they have demonstrated since the founding of AMOK TEATRO in 1998. Since then, every one of their productions, including this one, has earned what I would call unanimous applause from both audiences and critics alike.
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O Teatro me Representa (2022)
VOLTAR
