In 2002, shortly after the burst of the dot-com bubble, Porte Parole premiered 2000 Questions, a play that examined the culture of financial markets and speculation. Based on interviews with brokers, analysts, and fund managers, Annabel Soutar explored the mechanisms of financial capitalism — the pursuit of quick gains, the logic of risk, and the absurdity that emerges when profit becomes an end in itself.
Presented at the Cinquième Salle of Place des Arts, 2000 Questions marked a turning point for Porte Parole’s stylistic signature. For the first time, the documentarian appeared as a character. Through the figure of The Interviewer, Soutar turned her own research process into drama, revealing the tension between observation and participation, and between the investigator and her subject. Drawing on her personal story — that of a daughter seeking to understand a father from the world of finance — Soutar grounded her documentary approach in an intimate dimension where the personal and the political intersect.
In 2025, the play takes on a renewed resonance. The world of finance has only grown more complex — and more surreal — with crypto assets, fintech, automation, and algorithmic trading redefining how value circulates. Yet the fundamental questions Soutar raised remain: Who bears the risk? Who profits from speculation? And what part do individuals play in a global system that often escapes their control? More than twenty years after its premiere, 2000 Questions stands as a foundational work — the moment when Porte Parole’s signature emerged: documentary theatre that examines the world while questioning its own perspective.
From the vault
