Our reality is an amalgam of codified, superimposed realities. It is not stable and eternal, but subject to struggle. This research focuses on the relationship between acting and that political struggle for reality.

The question of the relationship between acting and reality, between the actor and their mask, is as old as theatre itself. The rise of the authenticity dogma, where actors are expected to be their supposed selves in theatre and film, gives new urgency to the discussion of mimesis. Does political space close up when the mask is assumed to be the self and the playing with masks becomes impossible? Is the critical dimension of acting also in danger of disappearing along with  the fiction?

Because of the lack of a lively contemporary critique of play, the representational system of acting is either thoughtlessly adopted or completely discarded. This doctoral research aims to nurture and actively propagate the tradition of critique of acting. To this end, both in a theoretical component and on the floor, I will start from the following research questions: how can acting problematize and reconfigure consensual fiction, that which we call reality? What kind of acting perpetuates? What kind of acting questions? What kind of acting changes?