Wielding both his tongue and his fists, the boxer Mohamed Ali, a prominent figure in the fight of black Americans for their civil rights, had made speech one of his weapons of choice. The power of the words of the triple heavyweight world champion, more than that of his jabsis returned to the room My name is Muhammad Ali.
There is no question here of following the pugilistic journey of the native of Louisville, Kentucky, nor of tracing his biography outside the ring. The figure of Ali, both champion and martyr, serves rather as a vector for exploring the condition of the African actor and his milieu. By a skilful play of mirrors, Ali’s struggles are juxtaposed with that of a black actor to “be someone” and that of African culture to exist and define itself outside Western gaze.
parallel of racism
From the solo show created in 2014 by the Congolese author Dieudonné Niangouna, the directors Tatiana Zinga Botao and Philippe Racine have chosen to make a plural monologue. There are therefore eight actors, of course Afro-descendants, who alternately embody, with dazzling or vulnerability, the different facets of Ali, but also of Etienne, an actor who is preparing to embody the legendary boxer on stage.
In a minimalist atmosphere, the horrors of Black History, from slavery to segregation, are never far away, being evoked in words or gestures by the troupe of actors evolving in osmosis. But My name is Muhammad Ali above all illustrates the battle of mentalities and the way in which injustice and racism have ended up shaping the imagination of both whites and blacks.
If Mohamed Ali was revolutionary, and still is, it is because the very existence of a black champion who proclaims himself “the most beautiful, the greatest” calls into question the supremacy of a white order. And if the journey of a black actor is so perilous, it is because he must constantly fight to preserve “his dignity and his honor” in a cultural universe where no one really knows what to do with him.
Like the actor, the boxer puts his body at the service of the show, even if it means being objectified, ridiculed, reduced to his physique or his sexuality. In the case of a black actor, there is the added weight of dispossession linked to the forced displacements and brutality suffered by populations of African origin over the centuries.
The multiplication of performers of different origins and generations (from veterans Widemir Normil and Martin-David Peters to the youngest like Anglesh Major, Rodley Pitt or Fayolle Jean Junior) serves the purpose of the piece by emphasizing the plurality of black experiences. The group effect also increases tenfold the evocative power of a sometimes dense text, causing the words to clack like punches hitting their target.
To exist, you have to fight, Niangouna tells us. “The world is a punch and hitting is a salutary act. »