Rébecca Chaillon Returns to Avignon with Afro-Feminist Manifesto 'La Parabole du Seum'

Rébecca Chaillon, an Afro-feminist director and playwright, will present her new dystopian manifesto 'La Parabole du Seum' at the 2026 Festival d'Avignon. The work targets grossophobia, queerphobia, transphobia, and racism. Born in 1985 in Montreuil, Seine-Saint-Denis, to Martinican parents, Chaillon studied theater at the Sorbonne and was shaped by popular education movements. She became a prominent figure in queer and Afro-feminist theater. In 2021, her piece 'Carte noire nommée désir' at the same festival sparked racist verbal and physical attacks against her and her performers, bringing attention to her provocative activism. Chaillon describes her approach as action feeding thought and theory feeding action, engaging with sexuality, gender, racial identity, hunger, the body, food, and amorous cannibalism.