Cover Image: The bustling atelier of Lacrima, where the creation of a royal wedding gown exposes a world of pressure, artistry and hidden human cost. Photo supplied.

Lacrima, Théâtre national de Strasbourg
Until 10 February, Heath Ledger Theatre

‘Blood, sweat and tears’  is a well-worn phrase that describes extreme effort or sacrifice. The name of Perth Festival’s opening show Lacrima, meaning teardrop, refers to only one element but is undeniably an exhaustive exploration of the whole. 

The setting is a Paris fashion house where the elaborate wedding gown of an unnamed English princess is being made under the webcam eye of maniacal British designer Alexander (Vasanth Selvam). Marion (Maud Le Grevellec), head seamstress at Maison Beliana, is at her wits’ end – for a myriad of reasons that emerge over three consecutive hours (of which more later.) 

Lacrima comes from the Théâtre national de Strasbourg, France’s only designated national theatre outside Paris. We learn early on that we will hear the story of the dress, the veil and the train through the individuals who touched the pieces. 

Director-writer Caroline Guiela Nguyen has stitched into this plot a pattern of global exploitation. The wedding gown train requires labour-intensive artistry that is outsourced to an Indian pearl-setting tailor Abdul (Charles Vinoth Irudhayaraj) in Mumbai. The intricate lace veil is handmade by modestly-paid women artisans plying a dying craft in rural Normandy.   

The risks of this enterprise are pushed far down the production line, like the pressure to meet deadlines. Yet an officious French overseer demands codes of safety and health checks that are self-evidently hypocritical, a point made by the Indian fixer staring down inhumane deadlines. 

The ‘safety’ codes do not even serve the atelier workers at Maison Beliana, not least the haunted Marion. In the haute couture world, failure is not an option.

Lacrima gathers pace from this point, slowing only to dissect the cruelty of an abusive marriage between Marion and Julien (Dan Artus), her husband and patternmaker under her direction. Marion is a kind of everywoman, her loyalties pulled in many directions – by a neglected daughter, an insecure husband and an impossibly demanding employer. 

Marion struggles to even draw breath, a motif that becomes a fourth element in the ‘blood, sweat and tears’ sacrifice of Lacrima.

Much is asked of Lacrima’s audience to follow an – at times – unnecessarily complex plot. A three-minute only ‘interval’ (‘Do not leave the room’) is a provocative test for the bladder-challenged, and for audience engagement – luckily, few patrons did more than stand, stretch and sit down again. 

Far more is demanded of Lacrima’s dozen actors, a brilliant ensemble clearly in command of the complex stage requirements. They routinely move between centre stage and side booths where webcams capture their intimate facial expressions or video calls and project them onto large screens above the stage.

Alice Duchange’s set design is an artful blend of atelier elegance – sheer drapes and mannequins sporting gorgeous fashions (by Benjamin Moreau). But it’s the technical brilliance of video designer Jérémie Scheidler that adds another story-telling dimension. The screens allow for seamless English translations of three spoken and one signed language, as well as close-up glimpses of lacemaker toil and Abdul’s eye-straining work sewing 230,000 pearls into the wedding train. (We learn later it will be worn by the English bride for precisely 27 minutes.)    

This is a sophisticated narrative about passion and exploitation – the lacemakers are as devoted as nuns to their métier; suffering for one’s art has a deep tradition. 

Lacrima does not fall into the trap of rosy nostalgia for an earlier artisan age or bald propaganda about post-colonial injustice. Yet Nguyen has clearly researched both and weaves a credible and diverting narrative about the underbelly of fashion. By contrast, a recent Art Gallery of Western Australia installation Time Rone replicated in precise detail the nostalgia of handmade fashion in an empty clothing factory but offered little insight into the context in which now-departed female workers would have worked. 

By the end of Lacrima’s three eventful hours, we know what price is paid in human blood, sweat and tears for a royal wedding gown. It’s storytelling at its imaginative best.

Lacrima runs at His Majesty’s Theatre with Perth Festival until 10 February. For more information or ticket purchase, visit: https://www.perthfestival.com.au/program/season-2026/lacrima