La fiction peut-elle être réaliste ? Deux visions théâtrales du supermarché : Le Grand Chariot de Jacky Viallon (1993) et Bonzy, la vie, mort ou vif d’Alain Cofino Gomez (2013)

The notion of reality in art and theater is not obvious nowadays : the strictly realistic mimesis does not have the appealing power as it used to have in the past, and the theatrical works touch the real problems (psychological, social, political, etc.), without referring to a plainly mimetic model. It brings forth an essential question: can the theatrical fiction be satisfied by a realistic aesthetic (classical). In the last decades, the works of different researchers talk about expanded, non-mimetic reality. The authors of this article agree with this thesis, and in order to support it, they analyze two prominently realistic theater plays. While discussing prominently realistic subjects (the universe of shopping centers and shopping), the authors rely on the ways of representation, negate the very meaning of the notion of reality, whether by tonality or the form, the mimesis in its strictest sense. Should we still apply the label “realistic”, or should we ask the question in a different way?