On three evenings in early May, something unusual unfolded on three very different stages in Brussels: La Tricoterie in Saint-Gilles, Ten Noey in Saint-Josse-ten-Noode, and Espace Rasquinet in Schaerbeek. There were no professional actors, no fixed scripts, no conventional staging. And yet, what emerged was theatre in its most urgent, unpredictable, and raw form. It was “Les Liaisons Joyeuses” 2025 — a citizen-driven performance that gave voice to those usually left out of the spotlight.

Conceived and directed by Belgian theatre-maker Frédérique Lecomte, the project brought together more than 60 participants from across the city — people of all ages, social backgrounds, languages, and identities — to create a living fresco of contemporary Brussels. Over the course of three intensive weeks of workshops, held in various community spaces, four groups co-created fragments of a show that were later combined into a singular, unrepeatable performance.

Lecomte’s method is both radical and refined. She works without fixed scripts, encouraging improvisation, spontaneity, and vulnerability. “I work with surprise,” she says. “With encouraging fragility, preserving spontaneity. I always try to put the performers in the right energy to invent with the greatest freedom possible.” This approach allows participants — many of whom have never set foot on a stage before — to express deeply personal, often political narratives through movement, gesture, and text.

The result was a performance that defied genre and structure. Opera, cabaret, circus, tragedy, and action theatre collided in scenes that shifted order from one night to the next. One moment, the audience watched a surreal monologue about exile and belonging; the next, they found themselves laughing at a chaotic group scene satirising bureaucracy or gender norms. The diversity of tone mirrored the diversity of its creators — a patchwork of voices unified not by style, but by a shared desire to be heard.

“Les Liaisons Joyeuses” is the latest project by Théâtre & Réconciliation, the company Lecomte founded three decades ago to use theatre as a tool for healing, dialogue, and resistance. Her work has taken her to post-conflict zones in Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo, where she has worked with survivors of trauma to stage performances that speak truth to power. In Belgium, her focus has remained on those living at the margins — refugees, prisoners, people in social housing or care homes — and on building bridges between individuals and communities who rarely meet.

In 2014, Lecomte was awarded the Performing Arts Prize of Hainaut for her singular methodology, and in 2018 she was named “Woman of Peace” at the Belgian Senate for her long-term work in the Great Lakes region. Her methodology — which she sometimes calls “orchestration in real time” — is not only about theatre, but about creating a temporary society on stage, one that models a different way of being together.

The atmosphere in each venue was charged with tension and intimacy. The lighting remained low, the staging minimal. Viewers often found themselves mere steps from the performers. At times, they were spoken to directly; at others, they were drawn into silent witnessing of moments of quiet power or collective eruption. Each show was different. Nothing was fixed. And yet, the effect was consistent: audiences left shaken, moved, and, above all, reminded that theatre — at its core — is about presence and transformation.

There is something revolutionary in the simplicity of this project. It does not aim to entertain. It doesn’t claim aesthetic perfection. Instead, it offers space — real, embodied space — for citizens to speak. And perhaps more importantly, to listen.

At a time when public discourse is increasingly polarised, and when marginalised voices are too often drowned out by dominant narratives, “Les Liaisons Joyeuses” reminds us that art can be a site of resistance. It can reimagine the very foundations of democracy — not as a system of representation, but as a practice of presence. On these stages in Brussels, democracy wasn’t debated. It was lived.