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Starting from a clinical situation of therapeutic mediation through theatre with a group of delinquent adolescents, the authors of this article offer two readings of the material gathered. The first gives priority to the dynamics of the capacity for holding and symbolization made possible by the stage. It is a matter, then, of constituting or reconstituting representations of envelopes as close as possible to the sensorial body permitting an openness to issues of symbolization. The second reading, drawing on the structure of the clinical sequence, raises the hypothesis that every act of theatrical improvization in a group setting plays out anew the very invention of the tragic theatrical setting. It is then the dialogical tension between the protagonist and the choir, allowing for the creation of scenic illusion and play, that animates the group which then becomes a theatre troupe. This unconscious dynamic permits the emergence of what the authors propose to call “tragic mediation”.