Cyril Augier founded and directs A Nous de Jouer !, a structure halfway between a theatre company, a consulting firm and a training centre. His bet: toconvey the sensitive messages of change through comedy.

Her show " Madame le directeur " is performed in companies that want to engage with their employees in a dialogue on gender diversity, professional equality and female leadership.

The EVE blog met him.

EVE: Hello Cyril, what kind of path leads to the creation of a hybrid structure like " It's up to us"?

Cyril Augier: An atypical career, of course! I've always been involved in theatre, my great passion, but I also went to business school and had a career in business. I have worked in the field of disability. One day, my employer said to me, " Why don't you write a play on the subject?" 

The idea came to me to create a company that would offer both " on the bill " (turnkey) shows on subjects of social responsibility, sustainable development, diversity, but also tailor-made shows (to respond to a particular situation in a given company), team-building and training services (management and public speaking, etc.).

EVE: Among your " on-the-bill " shows, we have spotted " Madame le directeur ", which features the issues of professional equality and female leadership. Why did you find this topic interesting?

Cyril Augier: For the record, this idea emerged during a carpooling trip with another man, whom I didn't know. Vincent (editor's note: Nicollet, the co-author of the play) and I spoke very openly that day, between young fathers, confronted with the same questions of the articulation of life times, each having also a partner struggling with new professional issues. We understood that beyond its resonances in the news, the subject of professional equality concerns us all, including us men.

So, we embarked on the creation of a thematic show: we did many readings, attended conferences (including one, by the way, organized by KPMG in Lyon), we met men and women from the business world, representatives of the social partners... And we took our time to write, we wanted to approach this subject with finesse, avoiding clichés, because we want to deconstruct stereotypes...

EVE: What is the argument of the play?

Cyril Augier: We used a classic mise en abyme process. It's always quite effective in identifying the ambiguities of a subject.

So, we have Gabrielle, a Human Resources manager, who aims to be promoted to HR Director, and whom her CEO is testing by entrusting her with the implementation of the company's gender equality agreement. She will be confronted at home with all the difficulties that her professional development can pose (in terms of family organization, balance in the couple to be renegotiated...) and at the office, with interlocutors who are not necessarily easy to convince and manage, from the militant feminist trade unionist to the macho manager who does not see where the problem lies.

EVE: You emphasize the disagreements around the agreement?

Cyril Augier: Yes, with well-planted characters, but not caricatures, who will be able to evolve.

Working on disagreements and tensions allows us to get out of the wars of position. It prevents everyone from getting stuck in their character, on the contrary it allows them to show their dark and light sides, their strengths and blind spots and to work on reconciling the contradictions of each person.

EVE: Gabrielle is " Madame le directeur ", this title itself is debated, isn't it?

Cyril Augier: Some people took it at face value, thinking that we were taking a position on the feminization of job names, some believing that we were right with the Academy and others that this title was sexist in itself and automatically disqualified the purpose of the show.

In reality, this is a deliberate fact, because in this title, we are already asking a question, we are already engaging in a dialogue. Not only on the feminization of job names, but also and above all on the question of masculine and feminine and what we accept of each other in oneself. Gabrielle will undoubtedly have to assume a part of masculinity in herself and above all play with the porosity of positions to exploit the whole range of her own management style.

EVE: Do you think that playing with stereotypes helps to get rid of them?

Cyril Augier: This is one of our choices. In particular, we have a very emblematic scene: the two " antagonistic " characters in the negotiation of the agreement will find themselves dancing a tango, which may seem to be the very embodiment of gender relations marked by domination.

Here, the objective is twofold: first , to re-examine the postulate that the man must necessarily lead the dance; second, to oppose the notion of struggle (between woman and man) with that of dance, where the two partners (whoever is in charge) work to move harmoniously, without confusing their roles. The metaphor, if it may seem provocative, is very conducive to exchange and reflection.

EVE: What reactions does the play provoke when you perform it in a company?

Cyril Augier: The play continues after the play, when we open the debate with the audience. The reactions are very sensitive, sometimes passionate.

What surprises me most often is that the women are sometimes very the character of Gabrielle, some are also in a form of denial of inequalities or find that the way the play talks about it is exaggerated (while, for the most part, the dialogues are based for the most part on real anecdotes that we have experienced or that have been told to us by the people we met while preparing the play).

I think that, in fact, women don't want to be victimized. This seems to me to be a very important criticism to take into account when we want to communicate on these subjects: encouraging gender equality probably also involves avoiding the assumption that women are always in a situation where they need to be helped.

They also need to say that they succeed in a lot and that they owe it to themselves.