Social Issues

Paris musical puts Harvey Weinstein back on the stand, audience rules guilty

By Marta Garde

Paris, Jun 18 (EFE).- The Rond-Point theater in Paris is making a jury out of its audience, tasking it with issuing a verdict to symbolically acquit or convict Harvey Weinstein.

So far, every play of the cabaret-style musical has found the movie producer guilty on all counts.

I forgive you (Harvey Weinstein) puts the patriarchy and toxic masculinity on public trial, personified by the now infamous film producer, who is serving a sentence of 23 years in prison in New York for various felony sex crimes.

Music, dance and social commentary blend in the satirical piece written and directed by Pierre Notte, who also stars as the musical’s main character.

“We want to organize a party of sorts around a tragedy. The tragedy is the violence that women suffer by the hands of men, especially certain monsters. To organize this tragic party we need singing, music, gags, poems and fables,” he told Efe.

The play portrays the whole Me Too movement and victims of sexual abuse on stage, including women victimized by other well-known public figures such as Dominique Strauss-Kahn, former head of the IMF, who was arrested in 2011 on sexual assault charges.

Humour drives the story forward, while dragging into the spotlight themes like sexual violence, murder, and gender wage and employment gaps, in a biting revision of the dominant narrative concerning gender roles, which has assigned women the burden of guilt or submission since the tales of Adam and Eve.

Weinstein gradually transforms into a woman on stage as he is confronted with his crimes, while the audience is lectured on the importance of preliminaries during sexual intercourse and the array of possibilities the clitoris provides.

The audience verdicts have been unanimous so far: Harvey Weinstein is guilty.

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