The poetics of imbalance
Un petit pas de trop brings together Kader Attou, Régis Truchy and Mansour Abdessadok in a creation where hip-hop meets burlesque. Between control and slip-ups, the three performers turn error into the art of bouncing back. Funny, poetic and virtuosic, this piece for all audiences explores the beauty of imbalance and the expressive power of the body.
Statement of intent
Three men meet on stage, each with his own world and his own obsessions.
The first is a perfectionist down to the tips of his toes. He wrestles with his own movements, striving for an impossible harmony in a rigorous quest, constantly pushing the limits of his control. His style is precise, almost measured to the millimetre, but his pursuit of perfection sometimes leads to involuntary slip-ups that spark laughter. The second is his opposite: unpredictable and eccentric, he gives himself over to wild improvisations, creating an unexpected energy in every scene. And the last is all nonchalance; he glides across the stage without seeming to commit, like a spectator of his own movements. This apparent indifference turns out to be a comic strategy, defying the expectation of perfection and adding a touch of mystery as he drifts from one corner of the stage to the other, almost as if he were there by chance.
The show explores the contradictions and misunderstandings born of their opposing styles. In each scene, their dances cross, collide, then finally merge into unexpected choreographies where every misstep becomes an excuse for a burst of laughter. A mise en abyme of failures turned into art, celebrating the unexpected and the joyful collisions of their very different worlds, and paying tribute to the beauty of hip-hop in its most spontaneous moments.
The audience is invited to follow this elusive trio, who break the rules of performance to offer a playful, uninhibited vision of hip-hop dance. Moving between moments of virtuosity and bursts of laughter, the show celebrates the art of the unexpected, where colliding styles become a joyful and poetic raw material, and where clumsiness and flashes of genius share the same light.
Interview with Kader Attou
Un petit pas de trop (One Step Too Far) is a title that is both light and profound. What does it mean to you?
It is the moment when the body lets go of control. This one step too far is the step that tips perfection into the unexpected, calculation into grace. It is a tiny gap, but that is often where the truth of movement appears: in the crack, in the breath of imbalance.
Burlesque seems to be new territory for you. What draws you to it?
There is something essentially human about burlesque. It speaks of the body that escapes, of the gesture that overflows. In hip-hop too, there is this tension between control and freedom, virtuosity and fragility. In Un petit pas de trop, I wanted to explore that porous zone between the seriousness of dance and the lightness of laughter, between beauty and accident.
How did this trio with Régis Truchy and Mansour Abdessadok come together?
We come from very different worlds. Régis has millimetre precision, Mansour has explosive movement, and I like to navigate between the two. Together, we explore contrasts: precision and letting go, tension and release. This dialogue creates moments where anything can tip over, and that is exactly what I am looking for: that point of unstable balance.
Burlesque and dance are in dialogue in this piece. Where do they meet?
In their relationship to the body. Burlesque pushes the gesture to excess, dance seeks it in its purity, but both speak the same language: the language of emotion. When dance stumbles, it becomes burlesque. When burlesque soars, it becomes dance. It is this breathing between falling and flying that interests me.
Humour here seems to be a gateway to a form of poetry.
Yes, humour is not an effect. It is a breath. It allows us to talk about the world gently, without lecturing. Laughing at yourself is a way of making peace with your own fragility. And dance, in this show, is exactly that: learning how to be off balance.
Choreography and staging: Kader Attou
Performers: Régis Truchy, Mansour Abdessadok, Kader Attou
Original music and sound design: Régis Baillet (Diaphane)
Lighting: Fabrice Crouzet
Set design: Olivier Borne
Production: Compagnie Accrorap
Co-production: Le Toboggan, Décines-Charpieu – Scènes & Cinés, Scène conventionnée Art en Territoire
With the support of: Pôle en Scènes
Creation schedule
June 2026: Cie Accrorap studio / Friche la Belle de Mai
September-October 2026: Le Toboggan; Pôle en Scènes: Pôle Pik, Albert-Camus
Premiere: Festival Karavel, 2 October 2026 (Le Toboggan, Décines)
Photos: © Damien Bourletsis DB Motion
Marie Plantin – Sceneweb
With Un Petit Pas de trop, choreographer Kader Attou chooses childhood, daydreaming and lightness in a sensitive and virtuosic tribute to the great burlesque figures of silent cinema. […] In a world in crisis where reality sometimes resembles a waking nightmare, Kader Attou and his accomplices respond with enchantment and the beauty of movement. […] He offers an antidote show, a cheerful and tender remedy to deadly ideologies.
R.B. – Télérama Sortir
TT A trio of super-performers for a burlesque escape into imbalance! […] This piece bets on accidents, slip-ups, obstacles and other collisions to spark a firework display of movement. […] Virtuosic and stunning, Un petit pas de trop blows up the clichéd images of hip-hop to awaken its humour.
Philippe Noisette – Les Echos
Hip-hop dance in France has a history, and Kader Attou has written some of its finest pages. […] The greatest success of “Un petit pas de trop” lies elsewhere, in this melancholy on a tightrope. Like Kader Attou in the air, held by almost invisible wires, dancing on his hands, then gliding above the stage. […] A show for all audiences, this “little step” to the side proves that hip-hop also has its inventors of forms.
Philippe Escalier – Sensitif
Intelligent in its construction, magnificent in its images, accomplished down to its transitions, the show wins the audience over from the very first minutes. An hour and ten minutes of elegance and smiles that keeps the house spellbound from the first gesture to the last. […] Kader Attou […] saves for himself the most striking scene of the evening, a flight whose beauty borders on the unreal.
Claudine Arrazat – Critique Théâtre Clau
Un petit pas de trop, choreographed by Kader Attou, draws us into a magical, fabulous world where dance, mime, burlesque, music and lighting give birth to a show of great poetry. […] A ballet full of humour, poetry and magic that makes us dream and rediscover our inner child.
Arthur Lefebvre – La Chronique
A little world of its own that makes this show a moment of pure joy. A magical illusion in the space of hip-hop, acrobatics and pantomime. […] Virtuosos and poets. Bodies ripple. Break apart. Embrace. Fly and leap in a single impulse. […] Charlie Chaplin as a king of hip-hop. Un petit pas de trop, the kind he knew how to take. A superb tribute.
Louis Juzot – Webthéâtre
Kader Attou accurately explores the close relationship between two languages of the body: dance and burlesque. […] Régis Truchy and Mansour Abdessadok are hip-hop references and brilliantly prove it in solos and duets that follow one another, expressing this one step too far on the edge of imbalance, also a way of revisiting pantomime.
Safidin Alouache – La Revue du Spectacle
In a very beautiful creation, dancer and choreographer Kader Attou blends physical theatre, dance and burlesque in a halo of fairy-tale magic. […] Time seems to welcome the performers’ magic in movements where grace is bound to theatrical expression. We waver between balance and imbalance, where a fall can come at any moment.
Nicolas Villodre – Danser Canal Historique
One of the most remarkable moments, choreographically speaking, is the duet of the doubles Truchy-Abdessadok […]. That said, Mansour Abdessadok’s virtuosic solos alone are worth the trip. […] Un petit pas de trop is embellished with gags, visual inventions and sleight of hand.
Micheline Rousselet – SNES Culture
At first glance, the elegance of dance or the virtuosity of hip-hop seem far removed from burlesque; yet, from slides to perilous recoveries, from clumsiness to brilliant failures, the three dancers lead us to burlesque. […] Humour and grace in this marriage of hip-hop and burlesque.
Chantal Boiron – Ubu Scènes d’Europe
Appearances and disappearances follow one another with virtuosity, the lighting adding a note of mystery. […] When the most ordinary objects start living their own lives and playing tricks on them, the gags multiply. […] A sensitive, dreamlike show that will charm all audiences.
Touring team
3 performers including the choreographer Kader Attou
1 tour manager
3 technicians: 1 stage manager, 1 lighting technician, 1 sound technician
Technical
Minimum stage 10 x 10 m
Set transport: 12 m3
Touring
En Votre Compagnie
Romain Le Goff – +33 6 80 36 08 03 – romainlegoff@envotrecompagnie.fr
Olivier Talpaert – +33 6 77 32 50 50 – oliviertalpaert@envotrecompagnie.fr
Representation of Accrorap – UAE · Spain · Germany
Bridge to Arts – Josep Alcaina – +49 155 1011 5922 – jas@bridgetoarts.com
2026
2 October
Décines, Le Toboggan, Festival Karavel (69)
14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 28, 29, 31, 1 October
Paris, La Scala (75)
© Damien Bourletsis DB Motion
Cie Accrorap
Directed by Kader Attou
Creation autumn 2026
A piece for all audiences for 3 dancers
Ages 8 and up
Premiere at Le Toboggan, Décines-Charpieu, Festival Karavel, 2 October 2026
Running time: 1h15
Dates
2026
20 November
Maisons-Alfort, Les Théâtres (94)
25 November
Bagneux, Théâtre Victor Hugo (92)
11, 12 December
Alès, Scène Nationale (30)
2027
14, 15 January
Belgique, Charleroi, Palais des Beaux-Arts
18, 19 January
Miramas, Tournée Mosaïque Arsud (13)
29 January
Castres, Théâtre Municipal (81)
4, 5 February
La Trinité, La Stella (06)
