Biche Prod

Who cares ?

Guillaume Bariou

Hybrid theatre. A solo set in a world on the brink.

How can we continue to inhabit a world that is falling apart?

On a cardboard island, Guillaume Bariou embodies a man cast adrift, carried by his thoughts and the stories of the world. Stranded there, he speaks to us, struggles, caught between his own stories and those of others.

He moves through storms, summons a tribe of masks, sifts through the debris of a collapsing civilization, and listens for the voices of future generations.

Blending theatre, dance, music and image, Who Cares? unfolds as a sensory journey, exploring what collapses and transforms within us.

I dive into the stories of others, as if to prepare myself for what’s to come.

Company presentation

Biche Prod is a company founded in 2014 by Guillaume Bariou. It develops a hybrid theatre at the crossroads of live performance, visual arts and sound. Its work explores sensory and immersive forms, where narrative fragments through the interaction of body, space and light.

Drawing on pop culture, cinema and radio creation, the company creates porous stage works that move between fiction and experience. It runs research laboratories in France and internationally, and advocates for a stage open to contemporary writing and marginal aesthetics.

www.bicheprod.com

Guillaume Bariou - Writer, director, performer

Writer, director and performer, Guillaume Bariou is the artistic director of Biche Prod, a company based in Nantes (France).

With Biche Prod, he has created seven works: Mundo Mantra (2015), based on Mantra by Rodrigo Fresán; Radio On (2019), a drive-in performance in public space based on a text by Falk Richter; Des balles qui se perdent (2020), a postmodern western; and Remplir la nuit (2021), a post-apocalyptic fable. This was followed by Airstream (live), an adaptation of the radio fiction Airstream, co-written with Sophie Merceron and premiered in October 2021, currently touring.

In 2022, he created Le monde ou rien with young non-professional performers from a priority neighborhood in Nantes. In 2024, he directed Nebraska, a text by Sophie Merceron commissioned by the company and presented at Le Lieu Unique (Nantes), as well as his first solo work, Who Cares?, which he wrote and performs.

Research is a central aspect of his work, allowing him to explore new territories of expression. From 2016 to 2021, he was an artist-researcher at L’L | Seeking Otherwise in Performing Arts (Brussels), where he developed a reflection on empathy. Since 2018, he has been developing the research project Theatre and Movement MV-IC on the memory of cities and the imaginaries of catastrophe, in collaboration with Sofian Jouini. Initiated in Agadir (Morocco) between 2018 and 2021, this project will continue in Japan, in Niigata, in 2025.

A sound artist and former radio station manager, he maintains a strong connection to radio and sound dramaturgy, which play a central role in his work. He has also been composing soundtracks for contemporary dance and theatre since 2004.

Distribution

Direction: Guillaume Bariou
Concept, scenography, writing, sound design and performance: Guillaume Bariou

Choreographic and dramaturgical support: Audrey Bodiguel

Vocal performance: Suzon Bariou

Lighting design: Willy Cessa

Lighting operation: Willy Cessa, Salomé Retailleau (alternating)

Sound and video operation: Christophe Sartori, Jérémie Morizeau (alternating)

Flag design: Sophie Cardin

Scenography assistant: Manon Allard and Léo Bureau

The Trace of the Dinosaurs (film)

Screenplay, co-direction and performance: Guillaume Bariou

Co-direction: Karim Bouheudjeur

Performance: Samir Bentayane

Music: Vincent Dupas

Production

Production Biche prod
Co-production: Le Lieu Unique – National Stage, Nantes; Le Grand T (Mixt), Nantes; Collectif FAIRE – CCN Rennes Bretagne; TU Nantes; Théâtre Francine Vasse, Nantes; Théâtre Onyx, Saint-Herblain; Bain Public, Saint-Nazaire
With the support of: Nantes-Rennes-Brest-Rouen-Le Mans Cooperation / Itinéraires d’artiste(s) Archipel
With the support of: Franco-Québec Fund for Decentralized Cooperation (FFQCD)
Residencies: CDN Normandie – Rouen; Chapelle Dérézo – Brest; La Fonderie – Le Mans; Théâtre El Hamra – Tunis (Tunisia); Le CENTQUATRE-PARIS; Collectif FAIRE – CCN Rennes Bretagne; Bain Public – Saint-Nazaire; Nouveau Studio Théâtre – Nantes

The early stages of this project were developed through a research process at L’L | Seeking Otherwise in Performing Arts (Brussels).