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by Alexis Diamond & Marie Louise Bibish Mumbu with Tatiana Zinga Botao, directed by Albertine M. Itela

Centre du Théâtre d’Aujourd’hui & Théâtre de la Sentinelle, The Theatre Centre, 1115 Queen Street West, Toronto

February 26–28, 2026

Nzinga: “Where am I from? People ask me this so often that I end up asking myself the same question”

How can theatre be political today? I am aware that the question I pose is vast, even somewhat pretentious, yet it is the central issue that crossed my mind as, disappointed, I left Nzinga, now running at the Theatre Centre.

The themes Tatiana Zinga Botao, co-author and sole performer, engages are themselves surrounded by a political aura. Twenty-first-century geopolitical debates remain deeply marked by the afterlife of colonialism. It is enough to invoke Edward Said’s Orientalism (1978) to recall how the deconstruction of the Western gaze has shaped contemporary critical thought. But how can theatre approach these debates, and what risks does it incur in doing so?

Co-written with Alexis Diamond and Marie Louise Bibish Mumbu, the script retraces Botao’s life trajectory. Born in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo), raised in Brussels, and later relocating to Quebec, she draws on this triple identity as the lens through which the performance explores identity and belonging. In its opening section, Botao foregrounds a geographical juxtaposition, placing memories and historical events from the different contexts that have shaped her life side by side. She recalls that in 1985, the year she was born in Kinshasa, Quebec was embroiled in debates over the language of its street signs, while in Belgium the Heysel Stadium disaster claimed 39 lives and injured more than 600 on the eve of the European Cup final. (It’s unclear whether anything more than coincidence links these events.)

From the outset, the piece attempts to dismantle expectation, directly confronting the audience’s imagined clichés. Positioned downstage left with a microphone, the performer dissects the etymology of “Congo” and critiques the cartographic distortions that minimize Africa’s physical scale. In these lecture-like moments, projections turn the string curtain upstage into a makeshift blackboard, underscoring the work’s pedagogical effort to unmask inherited bias.

In its second half, the work shifts into temporal superimposition. Botao’s biography is interwoven with that of the seventeenth-century Queen Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba (c. 1583–1663), with whom she shares her name. Reigning during Portuguese colonial expansion and the rise of the transatlantic slave trade, the queen fought to safeguard her sovereignty, securing it through calculated diplomacy. Beyond the shared name and a generalized rhetoric of resistance, the production stops short of developing a sustained dramaturgical dialogue between their histories.

Formally, the show moves across several modes. At times it is an intimate autobiographical monologue; at others, a lyrical embodiment of the queen. Occasionally it resembles a university lecture; elsewhere, an audience-interactive performance. The issue is not the plurality of modes itself but the absence of any structural integration. These registers are juxtaposed rather than developed in relation to one another, each standing largely on its own and often reiterating the same material instead of deepening or extending it.

The set design by Xavier Mary reflects this tension. The stage is divided: a wide expanse of sand occupies the foreground, where Botao moves, dances and wanders freely. Upstage, behind the string curtain stands a worktable. The metaphor feels almost too apt. Throughout the performance, the preparatory scaffolding (what in dramaturgy is called “table work”) remains visible, as though the material were not yet fully realized in theatrical form.

Thematically, the production offers little that reframes the issues it engages. The risk is that it addresses an audience already largely aligned with its premises, leaving limited space for contradiction or sustained interrogation. One might argue, as André Gide famously suggested, that “Toutes choses sont dites déjà; mais comme personne n’écoute, il faut toujours recommencer” (“Everything has already been said; but since no one is listening, it must be said again”).

Yet repetition alone does not constitute theatrical necessity. If the goal is to add one’s voice to the chorus of dissent, that voice must be formally distinct and sharper. A telling example in Nzinga lies in the repeated audience interactions: even when buoyed by Botao’s undeniable charisma, these moments feel more like digressions than structural pivots, failing to intensify or complicate the argument. Nzinga is passionately delivered, yet its political ambition ultimately exceeds its theatrical (and, ironically, its political) precision.

As a side note, alongside the usual surtitles, audience members are offered “augmented reality glasses” that project the translation directly into their line of sight, removing the need to choose between reading and watching. This device is not unique to this production but part of Théâtre français de Toronto’s ongoing practice: a simple yet carefully conceived intervention that renders accessibility less an add-on than an institutional principle.

Alesssandro Stracuzzi

Photos: Tatiana Zinga Botao. © 2026 Valérie Remise.

For tickets visit: theatrefrancais.com.