Forced Entertainment's 'Everything Must Go' Divides Avignon Audience

At the 2026 Festival d'Avignon, British collective Forced Entertainment presented 'Everything Must Go,' a performance created by Tim Etchells that ran from July 16 to 22 (with a break on July 19) in the Cour du lycée Saint Joseph at 10 PM, lasting 1 hour and 40 minutes. The set featured overturned chairs, scattered glasses, and empty bottles on tables, suggesting the end of a party or the world. Actors moved through the space, changing costumes and wigs while lip-syncing to AI-generated monologues in English, repeating platitudes. The performance was met with a polarized response: some audience members left, others laughed nervously, and many sighed in exasperation. Critics described it as chaotic, loud, and incoherent, with a mise-en-scène that felt like a caricature of 1990s modernity. Only the final 40 seconds offered a glimpse of what the show could have been, according to one review. The piece was criticized for being self-indulgent and boring, with the theme of contemporary fears drowned in abysmal tedium.