Rui Frati is an acclaimed Brazilian actor and director. Director of the famous Théâtre de l’Opprimé (Theatre of the Oppressed), in Paris, he emerges today as one of the main promoters and thinkers of the performing arts on a global level.
With an extensive and enviable CV, he has had the opportunity to work throughout his career with great figures such as Robert Wilson, Andrei Serban, Enrique Buenaventura, Augusto Boal, Ariane Mnouchkine, Maurice Vanneau, Alvin Nikolais, in a list that seems endless…
His career on the big stage began in Brazil, where he graduated in theater and sociology. During the seventies, he was forced to leave Brazil in exile, passing through several countries.
In Europe, before settling in Paris in 1979, he worked at the National Conservatory of Lisbon side by side with Augusto Boal, founder of the theatrical methodology, Theater of the Oppressed, one of the greatest figures in international theater. During the same period, they acted together in several theatrical projects, both in Portugal and France.
It was in the French capital, in 1998, that he recreated the Theater of the Oppressed and which he continues to direct today, succeeding Augusto Boal. There he develops the Theater of the Oppressed method, a methodology inspired by Boal’s teachings, among which forum theater is a theatrical game that turns spectators into actors trying to bring forth speech and reflection.
In addition to theater, many international projects and conferences, Rui Frati is also director of the MigrActions Festival, an international multidisciplinary festival (theater, music, photography, comics, dance, cinema, workshops, gastronomy…). The festival has been running since 2007, focused on migration between generations, cultures, disciplines, in the search for a better life.