Stepping Out Like Thespis
- Lauren Noble
- Mar 30
- 10 min read
Updated: Apr 14
Spotlight on Audrey Jegu by Lauren Noble
I cannot actually remember the exact moment I met Audrey Jegu. I do remember that I observed her from a distance at first and did so as she exuded an intensity that I wanted to understand better before I stepped into her orbit. A little-known fact about me is how much anxiety I have to manage in any social situation where I have not handled the curation or creation of the environment myself. I tend to withdraw and assess, trying to understand where the identity I am in that moment is most likely to be accepted. And with Audrey, she exudes an intensity that can come across as quite overwhelming for anyone who is not used to where it comes from and why it exists in the first place. In truth, that intensity that I was first so unsure of is probably one of the things I have come to love most about Audrey since falling into step with her through shared passions and projects over the last few years. I realise now that whilst I withdraw in moments of insecurity, Audrey tends to get bigger and bolder in her identity instead. Her intensity also makes her intensely observant. We meet for a coffee and #collabinconvo catch-up after more than a year since our last conversation, and she immediately comments that my recent updates both personally and professionally had her intuitively feeling that I was coming back from something. My journey towards healing is something I shone a spotlight on in a recent article about the act of returning to the self through the writing work I undertook with the phenomenally gifted multidisciplinary artist, Rebecca Crookshank. It was quite an unlikely happenstance, then, that the reason for my article on Audrey was to celebrate her launching Thespis Gen Studio, given that her realisation of this dream had occurred whilst I had withdrawn to a place of observation over engagement with most of my creative colleagues in Dubai. What I had not realised until our interview was that just prior to the second launch of Thespis Gen Studio - yes, there really was more than one! - Audrey had been going through something similar herself. Her act of returning had catalysed a sudden clarity of vision and mission for this experimental studio space for adults to learn and grow in the craft of theatrical exploration. And so we sat across from each other as we had so many times before. Just an Audrey and a Lauren. Swapping stage stories that would always leave us crying-laughing with the realisation of how ridiculous an artistic life in Dubai so often is. Exchanging energy as if we were scene partners building chemistry through a well-rehearsed dramatic duologue. And, somehow, always finding our way back to how we might transform our reveries into realities. Yet, this time felt different. I think we both acknowledged that we were two very different women sitting across from each other, engaging in a conversation that was steeped in more fact than fiction. It was the type of conversation neither of us would have had in the past because our past selves were dealing in ideas instead of implementations. But now Audrey has Thespis Gen Studio and I have Collab Company, both serving as extensions of everything we value and require for ourselves as artists who believe in the power and potential of the art forms we love.
Sitting down with Audrey is a vibe! She has this way of speaking, of finding poetry inside the phrasing she uses, even though (or perhaps especially because) English is not her first language. Audrey doesn’t just talk. She creates captivating imagery that makes you stop and think, but not for too long, because she moves quickly from thought to thought and I was barely keeping up with all her insights as we sat sipping chai lattes and iced coffees at Common Grounds in Dubai Hills Mall. There are some artists who command a presence that is often quite charged with intention. There is also an ease to some artistry which is what Stanislavski often referred to as those who are open to the phenomenon of inspiration. Audrey the performer has this sensibility in spades. She does not just walk onto a stage, she shifts its very atmosphere. I have had the pleasure of watching her perform in both French and English and no matter the language, it is clear that Audrey is a relentless seeker of artistic truth. To observe her speaking about her craft is to witness someone who has not only found their calling but has made the act of discovery itself a lifelong pursuit. Her entry into this world of performance was not based on a decision, she describes it as somewhat of an inevitability. As a child, she was a whirlwind. Intensely expressive. Unapologetically bold. Never one to hold back. Audrey alludes to my own earlier observations regarding her tendency to be so much more when she tells me that in many settings during her younger years and even sometimes today, the intensity she exudes is easily perceived as too much. The teacher in me feels a small pinprick to the heart for every child who has ever felt this way during a time in their life that they did not have the tools to unpack that belief before it took root and became part of their inner monologue. Then, of course, the moment Audrey stepped onto a stage, everything about her identity appeared to move into place. It was a teacher who first recognized that Audrey was not just a theatrical child, she was born for the theatre.
My teacher was an amateur actress on the side and decided to replace a lesson called Civil Education, I think, with theatre class every two weeks. It was because of this that I discovered a place where everything that was too much about me was suddenly not only accepted, but appreciated. I had found my home.
The same qualities that made Audrey stand out, often negatively, in her childhood suddenly became invaluable tools. Loudness became presence. Emotion became power. Spontaneity became artistry. This #collabinconvo is already paying homage to the childhood journey of all of us who have fallen in love with something and gave it permission to permeate through into every facet of our life. For Audrey, her love of literature, writing, and storytelling blended effortlessly with theatre, a space where those passions could intertwine and transcend boundaries. Suddenly, these disparate things in her life began to work collaboratively towards a unified mission.
Though her passion for performance was unwavering, Audrey - like so many students we have both taught over the years - was encouraged to follow a more conventional path. This is how she found herself in business school as a young adult, immersed in a world of pragmatism and structure. She knew she did not fit in here. Whilst she excelled academically in such a space, the feeling of walking a path not meant for her started to creep into her psyche. The moment she graduated, she knew she couldn’t ignore those instincts any longer. And in a style I have come to truly marvel at in Audrey, she did not wait for permission to do something about her situation, she simply granted it to herself. She started her training at the prestigious Les Cours Florent in Paris which meant that her days were filled with routine, but her nights belonged to the theatre.
I remember walking with my dad after my graduation from a German university and a French business school, and he asked which firm I would apply to. I hadn’t even thought it through, but the words just tumbled out: "Now I will go learn acting." I surprised even myself! It was like something inside me had been waiting for that moment to reclaim what I had buried.
Those evenings in class, surrounded by other passionate actors, were a second childhood for Audrey. A return to a home that she had never truly left in heart or in mind.
Audrey's life moved through various phases after that and she found herself in Dubai, taking on a range of unique freelance gigs and contract roles in the UAE for theatre, arts and culture, even media and marketing. Whilst the concept for Thespis Gen Studio had been brewing in her mind for years, it was actually the act of stepping away that caused a cataclysmic shift in Audrey's ability to move forward with it. Having described the bare bones of this dream to a friend in Dubai one day, her friend launched into arranging a beginner's workshop to make that dream become a reality. Audrey explains how overwhelming it was to receive such generous, unfiltered, wholehearted support for something that was for her from a friend who had absolutely nothing to gain from supporting Audrey in this way. It was so overwhelming to Audrey, in fact, that she ended up stepping away from everything for a while and permitted the audacious idea that she had a friend who had believed in her vision so fully and so long before she did (or perhaps could) herself. That pause, that moment of stepping back, became the catalyst for what Thespis Gen eventually became. And Audrey sees how the act of intentional, conscious generosity from her friend was instrumental in ensuring she reclaimed the right headspace for possibility to triumph over impossibility. She remembers the moment she was flying back into Dubai after deciding she was ready to reclaim her story for herself again, and the fully conceptualised mission, vision and aims of Thespis Gen Studio came pouring out of her mind and onto a page before the plane landed.
The act of reclamation is a recurring theme in Audrey's life and features heavily in her work with others within Thespis Gen Studio. I wonder if that has any relevance to the name she has chosen and so I ask Audrey to walk me through her decision. Obviously, it is a thoroughly documented fact that I have a minor degree in Classics with a focus on mythology, etymology and ancient Greek literature. Imagine how wonderful a surprise it was to discover that Audrey shares this love of all things ancient. As soon as the brand popped up on my social media feed a few months ago, I was reminded of the last time I had seen Audrey, when I handed her a copy of Madeline Miller’s Circe. It was a story of a woman often misunderstood, misrepresented even, and spoke directly to Audrey Jegu as a huge supporter of our first run of Antigone Retold in Dubai. It was back then that I realized how deeply connected we were in our love for ancient texts. She walks me through each facet of the name, starting with the story of Thespis. "Thespis was my way of bringing back the essence of the ancient," she explains. "We progress forward, but we always come back around. That’s how I see life. That’s how I see theatre." For Audrey, being European meant that ancient Greek theatre was embedded in her own cultural heritage. She saw Thespis as the intersection between the old and the new. The first actor to step away from the chorus and create dialogue, he represented something deeply aligned with her vision for this brand... finding one’s own creative voice.
Without disrespecting the chorus, Thespis stepping out was what allowed theatre to evolve. It wasn’t just about poetic language anymore, it was about starting a conversation.
I was most intrigued by the next part of the name because of how interactive the explanation became. Audrey was not satisfied with one interpretation, choosing a word which stood in for multiple versions. Gen is therefore layered with meaning. Sometimes genius, other times generation, and - of course - an obvious connection to genesis as the beginning of something new. Audrey has a beautiful way of articulating her philosophy. "I don’t own any truth besides my own," she says to me. "I am not an academic like you. I am not a qualified teacher like you. I created Thespis Gen Studio as a space for experimentation. A space where all people can come to create, to direct, to engage, to craft. Every breath they take in the silence is a moment of theatre to me. And that's all I can give them."
As we sip our coffee, Audrey talks a bit about the future. She dreams of partnerships with international acting schools, masterclasses from across the world, and new methods of training that push actors beyond their comfort zones. She imagines a scholarship program for those with talent but no resources, a space where artists don’t just train but create. The goal is to expand as Thespis Gen Studio evolves, organically. Classes, productions, experimentation, multilingual opportunities, international collaborations, local projects... the list goes on.
"Theatre should never be stagnant. It should be alive, moving, growing. As for me? I want to push boundaries. I don’t want to teach acting. I want to change how we see it. How we experience it. How we feel it."
I look over at this version of Audrey Jegu who is both familiar and unfamiliar to me. I have seen her standing in spotlights for a long time over the course of my knowing her in Dubai, but never before has she herself shone so brightly. This is a spotlight of her own making and yet entirely surrounded by supportive structures that she knows now that she can and must rely on. Collab Company is fortunate to be one such structure for Audrey and Thespis Gen, and I cannot wait to see what happens next in this exciting journey forwards.
I smile a moment for that that little girl called Audrey who felt like she was too much sometimes. Her adult self has stepped out, much like Thespis, into a space where that muchness has been harnessed and the true dialogue begins. A space where questions are asked and answered. A space where voices are heard. A space where we master our craft. A space where you can be and become anything your imagination can conjure. And if there is one truth that defines Audrey Jegu and Thespis Gen Studio right now, it is this: becoming is the essence of it all.
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© Lauren Noble for Collab Company | 2025
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