Until 7 years ago, they weren't allowed on stage. They couldn't even sit next to a man in the audience. And now Sfanh has been invited to perform in Riyadh, Dubai. Edah is a tiktok star. Farah is preparing a comedy cooking show with a well-known chef... As soon as they could, they dared to get up on stage and make people laugh. Not easy in Saudi Arabia, where the concept of a comedy show was banned for years. So women standup comedian...
Today, Sfanh, Farah, Maha and Edah are showing that anything can change in a society that is still very conservative. Sfanh loves driving in Djeddah's anarchic traffic. Maha lives alone with her sister, which upsets her landlord.. They all have their own passports, applied for in their own names. They wouldn't even have dreamed about it before 2016.
Because that was the year that Crown Prince Mohammed Ben Salmane initiated an express opening-up of the country in a radical geopolitical and economic shift. Today, only a fraction of young people applaud this unhoped-for gain in freedom, perceiving in transformations the opportunity for a long-awaited emancipation. However, a majority express concerns that the changes are eroding the foundations of Saudi Arabia. Outside the home, 95% of women are still veiled, and those who go out late at night in mixed-sex venues are pioneers. Women are constantly walking a tightrope. However, they are making progress, despite preconceived ideas and traditions that are inevitably very present.
Meet the pioneers of women's laughter, who are taking to the stage in one-woman shows, improv and stand-up, and shaking up a society that's a little lost.

Our approach
To better understand the changes taking place in the Saudi society today, we wanted to give a voice to pioneering women. They can talk not only about their situation today, but also about their careers and their struggles. What real impact has the end of male guardianship had on their lives, the possibility of going on stage, of driving, of living on their own or in shared apartments, of enrolling their children in school themselves? The first Saudi women to dare to make people laugh have necessarily had an atypical career, but one that reveals the upheavals in Saudi Arabia.