Says Othello: "Remember Aleppo"

Arabi21 News recently published a portrait of Aleppo in anticipation of its fall. Much of the article is an effort to emphasize the deep history of the city and its people. Alongside reminders that the city is among the oldest in the world, and listed among its contributions to world culture, the article states:

"Among the witnesses of Aleppo's public renown is that it is mentioned twice in the stories and plays of William Shakespeare, in Macbeth and in Othello."

The passages in question are, of course, the words of the First Witch in Macbeth, Act 1, Scene Three: "Her husband's to Aleppo gone, master o' the Tiger," a reflection of the city's place in the economy of Jacobean England, and of Britain's shipping ties in the Mediterranean.

The second is far more famous, as Othello's final speech before his death in Act 5, Scene 2, in which he describes his killing a Turk who had beaten a Venetian:

Soft you; a word or two before you go.
I have done the state some service, and they know't.
No more of that. I pray you, in your letters,
When you shall these unlucky deeds relate,
Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate,
Nor set down aught in malice: then must you speak
Of one that loved not wisely but too well;
Of one not easily jealous, but being wrought
Perplex'd in the extreme; of one whose hand,
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away
Richer than all his tribe; of one whose subdued eyes,
Albeit unused to the melting mood,
Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees
Their medicinal gum. Set you down this;
And say besides, that in Aleppo once,
Where a malignant and a turban'd Turk
Beat a Venetian and traduced the state,
I took by the throat the circumcised dog,
And smote him, thus. [Stabs himself]

In a way, it is poignant that defenders of such a great city cite as evidence of its humanity the words of a writer such as Shakespeare. Syrians, after all, do not need Shakespeare in order to be human. There is much in Aleppo's history that is admirable and noteworthy, aside from two brief mentions by a writer from an island far away.

And yet, in light of current events, there is something very fitting in the fact that one of Shakespeare's most tragic characters ends his role with a speech that essentially says:

"Remember Aleppo"

Academic article on Arab Shakespeares for British audiences

Happy to report that three years after the theatre festivals it analyzes, the article I co-authored with Saffron Walkling and Raphael Cormack for the Routledge journal Shakespeare is live: 

Margaret Litvin, Saffron Walkling & Raphael Cormack (2015): Full of noises: when “World Shakespeare” met the “ArabSpring.” Shakespeare.

We look from various angles at Ashtar's Richard II, Monadhil Daood's Romeo and Juliet in Baghdad, and APA's Macbeth: Laila and Ben--A Bloody History.
First 50 readers can download an eprint here.

Special Issue on Global Shakespeares, reviews of Al-Bassam and Achour plays

Shakespeare (The British Shakespeare Association) Volume 9, Issue 3, September 2013

Special Issue on Global Shakespeares, edited by Alexander Huang

Available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rshk20/current#.UkR-NSR57rg

Video clips that accompany the articles are available on: http://globalshakespeares.mit.edu/

If interested in reading an article from the issue please contact Alex Huang (acyhuang05@gmail.com)

ARTICLES

Global Shakespeares as Methodology

Alexander C. Y. Huang
pages 273-290

Having reached a critical mass of participants, performances and the study of Shakespeare in different cultural contexts are changing how we think about globalization. The idea of global Shakespeares has caught on because of site-specific imaginations involving early modern and modern Globe theatres that aspired to perform the globe. Seeing global Shakespeares as a methodology rather than as appendages of colonialism, as political rhetorics, or as centerpieces in a display of exotic cultures situates us in a postnational space that is defined by fluid cultural locations rather than by nation-states. This framework helps us confront archival silences in the record of globalization, understand the spectral quality of citations of Shakespeare and mobile artworks, and reframe the debate about cultural exchange. Global Shakespeares as a field registers the shifting locus of anxiety between cultural particularity and universality. The special issue explores the promise and perils of political articulations of cultural difference and suggests new approaches to performances in marginalized or polyglot spaces.

Hamlet, the Heike and the Fall of Troy

Peter S. Donaldson
pages 291-303

 

Postcolonial hybridity: The making of a Bollywood Lear in London

Kinga Földváry
pages 304-312

 

Caribbean tricksters at crossroads: Davlin Thomas's Lear Ananci and Hamlet: The Eshu Experience

Giselle Rampaul
pages 313-321

 

European touring stars and the Shakespearean distinction of the Spanish actor-manager in Madrid and Latin America (1898–1936)

Juan F. Cerdá
pages 322-329

 

What's global about global Shakespeare? The case of Perttu Leppä's 8 päivää ensi-iltaan (8 Days to the Premiere)

Nely Keinänen
pages 330-338

 

 

REVIEWS

Review of Sua Incelença, Ricardo III (directed by Gabriel Villela for Clowns de Shakespeare) at Largo da Ordem, Curitiba, Brazil, 29 March 2011

Anna S. Camati & Liana C. Leão
pages 339-341

 

Review of Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus (directed by Silviu Purcarete), the National Theater in Craiova, Romania, 14 March 1992

Lucian Ghita
pages 342-346

 

Review of Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale (Directed by Anirudh Nair and Neel Chaudhuri for The Tadpole Repertory and Wide Aisle Productions), Zorba the Buddha Performance Space, Ghitorni, New Delhi, India, 3 March 2013

Jyotsna Singh
pages 347-349

 

Review of The Speaker's Progress (directed by Sulayman Al-Bassam), Paramount Theatre, Boston, USA, October 12-16, 2011

Margaret Litvin
pages 350-352

 

Review of La Tempestad (directed by John Mowat for the Companhia do Chapitô) at the Corral de Comedias, Almagro, Spain, 23 July 2011

Carla Della Gatta
pages 353-355

 

Review of Hamlet or Three Boys and One Girl (adapted and directed by Nikolay Georgiev and the @lma @lter Student Theatre-Laboratory) at the Theatre Hall of Sofia University, Bulgaria, 12 March 2013

Georgi Niagolov
pages 356-358

 

Review of Shakespeare and APA's Macbeth: Leila and Ben – A Bloody History (directed by Lotfi Achour) and the company's talkback at Re-making Shakespeare for the World Shakespeare Festival at the Northern Stage, Newcastle, UK, 14 July 2012

Saffron J. Walkling & Raphael Cormack
pages 359-361

 

Review of Robert Lewis' Red Hamlet (directed by Robert Lewis) for the Group Theatre, New York, October 1933

Jeffrey Butcher
pages 362-364

 

Review of Shakespeare's Othello (directed by Nikos Charalambous for the Cyprus Theatre Organization) at Latsia Municipal Theatre, Nicosia, Cyprus, 27 November 2010

Eleni Pilla
pages 365-366

 

 

 

REVIEW ARTICLE

Giving a “Local Habitation” to “Airy Nothing”: Review of the Global Shakespeares Video and Performance Archive

Haylie Brooke Swenson
pages 367-372

Versions of Macbeth on the Egyptian stage

One thing the Arab uprisings have achieved for sure: an increase in the number of Macbeth productions.  The play was never much performed before, for obvious reasons.  Now it can be -- though I'm sure directors still have to tread with care.
This season the Cairo-based director Khaled Galal, who has previously done spoof or pastiche versions of Antony and Cleopatra and Hamlet, has assigned the directing students at the state-funded Creativity Center to do different versions of Macbeth.  These will be performed throughout the month of February, according to Al-Masry Al-Youm. Looking forward to hearing about these.

Does Asma Assad [heart] Lady Macbeth?

The Syrian First Lady's web site has been hacked, probably some time ago. They did a rather good job:

I am Asma Assad. I am the wife of a vicious war criminal.  He murders innocent civilians. He sends his henchman to torture children, snipe innocent civilians, rape women, young girls, and boys. He is currently decimating my hometown, Homs. He bombs mosques, churches, hospitals and his brutality knows no limits. He is trying to pit Alawites against Sunnis against Christians and against Kurds. I told him this will not work, but he is confident that it will. He thinks he can fool the American public with pleasant interviews.

On the list titled "My Heroes" on the right side of the bio page, nestled between Marie Antoinette and her father, Fawaz Akhras: Lady Macbeth.

"Othelliano" in Egypt

The bits of good news are that the Hanager is open and even before the lifting of Cairo's nightly curfew in mid-November, it seems people were somehow able to go.

Hanager opened with a production of Macbeth earlier before putting on a "popular" adaptation of Othello in early November, titled Othelliano and directed by Reda Hssanin. According to reviewers, it highlighted the comic and farcical aspects of the play and included various elements of "spectacle" such as puppet theatre.  Ahram articles here and here (in Arabic).  Facebook page for the show here.
And isn't their poster gorgeous?

Shakespeare alive and well in Tunisia

Today was the third anniversary of Mohamed Bouazizi's self-immolation, the official spark that ignited the so-called Arab Spring. Whatever else may be happening in Tunisia (national dialogue, uneasy negotiations between secularists and Islamists
On BBC this morning, Lise Doucette began her polyglot report on Tunisia (download here; listen at 11:00 - then go back and notice the cultural politics of language, how Rachid Ghannouchi and some others speak beautiful standard Arabic, Beji Caid Essebsi predictably speaks French, the Salafists speak accented and French-inflected but extremely expressive English...) from a theatre, Toufik Jebali's Teatro, where the new cycle of his satirical show Klem Ellil Zero Virgule (Night Talk Zero Comma, or 0.00 as we might translate it in English) was playing to what others described as packed houses.
"And you use Shakespeare - why use Shakespeare in this very Tunisian production?" she asks Raouf Ben Amor, obviously intrigued."And is it a comedy?"  "Nooo, a tragedy," he insists jauntily. "A tragedy that we meet with as a comedy."
Jebali has posted 16 mins of clips from the show (with French subtitles) at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kELqhhtyoA.  Look for the Hamlet lines starting around 2:57, where Hamlet's "Seems, madam?" speech is addressed (in English) to a niqab-wearing mannequin in a weird critique of Islamists' "customary suits of solemn black" and all the hypocrisy they connote.  Then around 6:50 for the inevitable 2B||!2B:
(It seems Ben Amor is taking the occasion to reminisce about his days as a theatre student in London in the 1970s.)

And of course, the obsession with morgues and gravediggers, the feeling of danse macabre throughout.  As reviewer Asma Drissi puts it:

Dans Klem Ellil zéro virgule, Shakespeare trouve bien sa place, les apparitions de Raouf Ben Amor dans des monologues d'Hamlet ou de Macbeth viennent souligner cette obsession de la mort. Des têtes, des membres, des corps avec des excroissances totalement difformes, des monstres, en somme... il semblerait que Jebali veuille nous dire que nous avons accouché d'un monstre!?

And she goes on to point out that the habit of reading between the lines of a play script, decoding the taboos, so well developed under the authoritarian Arab rulers of the past 40 years, still works to enhance theatregoers' pleasure in Tunisia even today:

Entre rires et émotions qui nous prennent à la gorge, Klem Ellil zéro virgule nous livre tout, sans discours directs et enflammés... lire entre les lignes et s'adonner à un exercice intellectuel pour décrypter les non-dits; c'est à cela que nous invite Jebali, mais on peut aussi se suffire au simple rire libérateur que nous offre cette pièce, le théâtre de Jebali a toujours fonctionné ainsi... A vous de choisir votre propre lecture des choses.

Among other bits of Shakespeariana in Tunisia: another show last summer from serial Shakespeare adaptaer Mohamed Kouka, called Shakespeare Ech Jebou Lena.  Apparently it "offers a humorous take on how Shakespeare's comedies are still relevant in contemporary society." 

And of course there's the semi-expat production of "Macbeth: Leila and Ben" (which has been mentioned here before) - enjoying quite a run after London's 2012 World Shakespeare Festival.  It was warmly received in Tunisia last spring. Although "much awaited" at the Carthage Theatre Days festival last month (which sounded amazing), it was canceled at the last moment for health reasons when director Lotfi Achour had to be hospitalized in Paris; Jebali's play was scheduled instead.  Hopefully Achour has recovered; last week the show toured to Sao Paulo, Brazil!  It's scheduled to open at Paris's Tarmac Theatre in January 2014.

offers a humorous take on how Shakespeare’s comedies are still relevant in contemporary society. - See more at: http://www.tunisia-live.net/2013/05/15/what-is-on-in-tunis-may-15-22/#sthash.nr2OmF4K.dpuf

offers a humorous take on how Shakespeare’s comedies are still relevant in contemporary society. - See more at: http://www.tunisia-live.net/2013/05/15/what-is-on-in-tunis-may-15-22/#sthash.nr2OmF4K.dpuf

 

El-Sisi as Macbeth

Bloody days in Egypt.  A Pakistani columnist (might they know a thing or two about military dictatorships propped up by a well-manipulated Islamist threat?) predictably and accurately invokes Shakespeare to size up the carnage, implicitly comparing Egypt's de facto ruler Abdel Fattah El-Sisi to Macbeth.  The interesting part is his critique of Mohamed El Baradei, the Nobel laureate/coup backer/fig leaf vice president/perennial tweeter of truth to power whose belated post-massacre bout of conscience has driven him to exile in Vienna.  El Baradei is compared, a bit shockingly to my eyes (is it the gender dimension? or the implication that he has actual blood on his hands?) to Lady Macbeth:

Interim Deputy President of Egypt, Mohamed Mustafa El Baradei, generally considered as a toady of the West, has resigned protesting the military crackdown. However, can he absolve himself of the responsibility? He cannot remove the innocent blood of thousands of innocent Egyptians off his hands like Shakespeare's Macbeth after the murder of Duncan:

“Will all great Neptune‘s ocean
wash this blood,
Clean from my hand? No, this my
hand will rather
The multitudinous seas incarnadine,
Making the green one red” (II:2).

Nobel Laureate El Baradei, rightfully considered as the enemy within, stands among them who have turned red the blue waters of the Mediterranean. History is witness that people, who have innocent blood on their hands and conscience, are judged even posthumously and most often they taste the fruit of their crops in their lives. Shakespeare again points this fact through Macbeth's soliloquy in Act 1 Scene VII very well:

“But here, upon this bank and
shoal of time,
We'd  jump the life to come.
But in these cases
We still have judgment here;
that we but teach
Bloody instructions, which,
being taught, return
To plague the inventor: this
even-handed justice
Commends the ingredients of our
poison’d chalice
To our own lips.”

I don't know enough about Pakistan to pinpoint the local targets of Syed Javed Hussein's critique, but it sounds like there might be some.

Bashar as "Brutus or Macbeth"

Franklin Lamb at Countercurrents writes of Bashar al-Asad's most recent non-concession speech, delivered in operatic style at the Damascus Opera House:

The nearly 1,400 seating capacity Opera Theater was packed for yesterday’s presidential address, and as in the final scene of Mozart’s Opera, the conclusion of Bashar Assad’s performance was followed by, as Mozart wrote, “a night-long celebration” among many of his supporters here in Damascus. Basher Assad’s glory, as he tried to leave the stage last night and was swarmed by scores of admirers, may not have been that of Caesar’s, during the Gallic wars as the latter also portrayed a domestic crisis and challenge as a defensive struggle to save “Rome”. And granted, it is unlikely that Syria’s president will appear to his critics as posh as John Kennedy at Vienna’s Opera House. But the man connected with his audience (s) during his watershed speech. He excelled in delivery, content and, most critically, stating and advocating what he believes is his countryman’s case. While welcoming foreign advice on how to end the current crisis, he insisted that the Syrian people throughout their history of resistance to occupation and hegemony have rejected the orders from certain governments he referred to, in the current crisis, as the “masters of the puppets” who are every day causing death, destruction and deprivations across the Syrian Arab Republic. Admittedly sleep deprived, this observer, as he listened to Bashar Assad’s address was reminded of a Macbeth or Brutus soliloquy. I could not help but transpose in my mind Brutus’ plea in Act 3, Scene 2 of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar:

“Who is here so rude or unpatriotic that would not be a Syrian? Who is here so vile that will not love his country? If any, speak–for him

I have not intentionally or unjustly wronged. I pause for a reply.”

Following his presidential address to the nation, one local journalist, who is sometimes critical of the regime, elaborated–in answer to my question about Assad’s apparent enduring popularity during this tragic period for people of Syria: “It’s true. And it’s partly due to the fact that he is modest, even humble– and well-educated in contrast to some regional monarchs who are essentially illiterate and uninterested in the world outside their fiefdoms palaces.”

  ... but which is he, Brutus or Macbeth? 

I'm not usually a big fan of Fouad Ajami, but in this case (talking about John Kerry) I think he has hit on the right allusion:

Kerry said Assad delivered on the requests he made. But Fouad Ajami of Stanford's Hoover Institution says Kerry was "snookered."
"Bashar was a very, very talented man with his lovely lady, with his Lady Macbeth, with his wife, at charming foreign visitors and I think the charm worked on John Kerry," Ajami said.

 Because, as in Macbeth, the charm is an inextricable part of the slime.

Early reviews of the Tunisian Macbeth

The surtitles caused problems, but the show seems to have been effective at least in stimulating people's emotions, if not in teaching them anything very new about Tunisia or Shakespeare. The big achievement - scenographically as well as politically - seems to have been the commentary on the "puppet" nature of Ben Ali's regime: a puppet to Bourghiba, to his wife, to the authoritarian structure of events demanding a dictator to come and fill the space.

Ibrahim Darwish's long column (in Arabic) focuses on the dis/similarities between Shakespeare's Macbeth (motivated by ambition and some idea of masculinity) and the Tunisian Ben Ali; he also highlights the production's critique of the original sins of the Bourghiba regime, conveyed through inter-scene documentary footage (including discussion of Ibn Khaldun), the voice of the narrator, and the puppet show.

A kind but ambivalent blog review by Miriam Gillinson (also here) faults the show for trying to overload on ideas, but somehow settles on the cliche of praising the "simple" and "raw" (not to mention "pulsing" and "throbbing") qualities of African-produced theatre. I think the song she refers to at the end is Abu Qasim al-Shabbi's poem, "If a people one day wanted life" (multiple translations and discussion here), which has played such an important part in the Arab uprisings:

But then the production veers off again, now focusing on the strange power that Bourguiba still holds over his predecessor, Ben Ali. This has promise – after all, the idea of regal ghosts haunting their successors has a rich, Shakespearean twang to it. There’s a wonderfully weird scene, in which a larger than life model of Bourguiba taunts Ben Ali, mocking his achievements. But this idea is sustained only for a few minutes before the show scampers off again, eagerly in pursuit of other ideas.
The most effective scenes are the seemingly slight ones – the simple scenes that, almost incidentally, throb with immediate meaning. There are a number of wrenching songs that say far more about Tunisia and its trapped citizens than the rest of the show put together. The style of singing – the same singing you hear calling people to prayer at mosques – pulses with revealing contradictions. That searing wailing sounds pained but resilient, too.  It’s a little bit ugly but there’s also a raw beauty and power to the music, which screams out on behalf of all those citizens who have neither the strength or means to make themselves heard.

Another reviewer's experience provokes a diatribe against subtitles:

Throughout, the giant screen at the back keeps up a running subtitle commentary in rather disjointed English. It is more confusing than enlightening and muddles the effect of all of the hard work by the actors. The screen is so big that reading full sentences really gives your eyes a work-out and there are parts where they flash by so fast it is a struggle to keep up. Why choose to base a production on such a well-known Shakespeare, if you then feel you have to provide a word-for-word translation to keep people up to speed?

For more on the show, including pictures of the interesting puppet sequence, see director Lotfi Achour's Facebook page, particularly this album.  And there's still time to catch it in Newcastle (and respond to my discussion questions)

If you're in London or Newcastle: Tunisian Macbeth

I was flirting with buying a last-minute plane ticket to go see the Tunisia-themed Macbeth adaptation, but looks like it won't happen. So I'd love to hear from friends and colleagues who are going to get to see it in London this weekend or Newcastle next weekend. Specifically, some things I'd love to know, besides general questions of scenography/performance/multimedia use/etc:

• how does the show reinforce/challenge the expectation of the folks in Stratford&London who commissioned it?  (I take these expectations to be: Shakespeare is Global, all you participating companies are local.)
• how does it corroborate or play with British preconceptions about the "Arab Spring"? Is it generally optimistic/pessimistic? How does it show the causes of the uprising?  the role of the West in it?
• how rich is the engagement with Shakespeare? is it just a pretext (Laila=Lady M, something you see in media accounts all the time) or do the adapters work to find interesting equivalents for the witches, ghosts, orphans, other plot or character details?
• as a show partly funded by the Tunisian Ministry of Culture, i.e. by an Islamist-leaning government its directors don't very much like, how does it address the question of transition - is there a Macduff? - is there peace and closure at the end? or darkness and censorship? or...?
• what kind of language games are played? Is there significance to any code-switching between fuSHa and 3ammiyya, or integration of English or French?
• how is Tunisian culture portrayed or not portrayed?
• how does the show speak differently to different audiences, with their different levels/types of background knowledge and different interests (Shakespeare buffs, political junkies, expats, etc.)?  Is it possible to get a range of reactions from non-Arab Londoners, Arabs in London, Tunisians in London, eventually (if it ever tours there) Tunisians back home?  Who laughs at which jokes?
• how are documentary sources (e.g., news footage?) integrated into the play? What's their function?

I will happily credit and post here as guest articles any responses I receive by email or as comments to the blog.  Thanks much!

"Leila and Ben" (timely Tunisian Macbeth)

The National previews Lotfi Achour's Tunisian-themed Macbeth adaptation, premiering in London this July and playing Tunis in September.

Gary Wills on Shakespeare and Verdi

No Arab connection per se, and kind of unexpected to find Wills (brilliant polymath though he is) writing about this, but check out this great NYRB piece on the authorship of Shakespeare and Verdi, and the day-to-day theatrical work that was inseperable from it in both men's lives.  Theatre shaped by actual conditions: not only sponsorship but available talent!  What a great idea.  (And what a frequent reality in Arab companies as well.)
Of course Verdi -- whose work inaugurated Khedive Ismail's opera house -- was an even earlier and more decisive influence in Arab theatre than Shakespeare has been.

Qaddafi as Macbeth one last time

Robert Worth in the NYT:

That is what made the Libyan revolt such a riveting spectacle: unlike the other embattled Arab Spring dictators, Qaddafi showed no doubt, no instinct for compromise and self-preservation. He never really tried to stave off the end with half-hearted “reforms.” He seemed to know he was plunging himself and Libya down a tragic path, and, like Macbeth, to embrace it. Perhaps he understood that he had gone “so far in blood” that there was no turning back. In retrospect, his whole 42-year reign seemed to follow an inexorable arc toward ruin. From the handsome young revolutionary who inspired such hope in his people he transformed into the drugged, puffy-faced madman howling for slaughter in the streets of his own cities. Many Libyans told me they believed Qaddafi used black magic to keep himself in power for so long. I was almost tempted to believe it. I found Chadian witchcraft amulets in some of the weapons depots abandoned by his loyalists. Before his death, he behaved like someone who had sold his soul to the devil, and, like Faust, was waiting to be dragged down to Hell.

A Tunisian-themed Macbeth

Thanks to my friend Scott Newstock for alerting me to this Tunisian-themed Macbeth added to the roster of the global Shakespeare festival on the occasion of the 2012 Olympics:

Macbeth: Leila and Ben – A Bloody History – Artistes, Producteurs, Associes from Tunisia combine Shakespeare with film and reportage (LIFT at London's Riverside Studios, Northern Stage – in Arabic with English surtitles).

There are not a lot of Arabic productions of Macbeth, for whatever reason, and even fewer adaptations. (Low prestige? High censorship?)  But the time may be ripe for a production keyed to ousted Tunisian president Zine el Abdine Ben Ali and his widely reviled wife Leila.

Globe's young-adult Macbeth in UAE

Take a break from watching a bloody dictator fight to the death against foreign-supported rebels on satellite TV... to watch one do it on stage.

London's Globe Theatre educational project (Globe Education's Playing Shakespeare with Deutsche Bank) is bringing its "educational" version of Macbeth to the UAE.  The performance of the show, created specifically for teenagers, was last night at the Abu Dhabi Theatre (would love to hear about audience reception from anyone who was there) and on March 27 and 28 at Al Madinat Theatre, Dubai.

Classicism as experiment (Blood Horse)

Sonali Pahwa sent me her review of the Iraqi Macbeth, performed at the Cairo International Festival of Experimental Theatre this week. She makes the point that staging old-school classicized Shakespeare in today's Iraq is a pretty daring experiment in its own right. As my teacher Farouk Mustafa once put it: "art for art's sake, for life's sake." Thanks, Sonali!

On entering the Miami (formerly Fuad el-Mohandes) theatre to watch the Iraqi play Hussaan al-damm (Blood Horse), I thought it inevitable that the performance would draw a gathering of Iraqi expatriates. But I didn’t expect to see a large satin Iraqi flag hung at the entrance, signalling that this was no ordinary CIFET event. Inside the theatre, the air echoed with the distinctive ‘j’ and ‘ch’ sounds of Iraqi Arabic as groups of early arrivals waited for the show to begin. The crowd was considerably more elegant than your average intellectuals. Men in suits and women with fulsomely coiffed (and uncovered) hair comported themselves as if at an embassy party. Only the well-loved oudist Nasseer Shamma came in his customary t-shirt.
The Patriotic Troupe for Acting presented a much-abbreviated adaptation of Shakespeare’s tragedy Macbeth, seemingly a relevant text through which to comment on the power struggles of contemporary Iraq. It was done in classical fashion, however. The performance was composed of a series of monologues and dialogues, enacted in dramatic lighting, which relied quite straightforwardly on the power of the text. The actors playing the adumbrated cast of Macbeth, Banquo, Lady Macbeth and Macduff all delived their lines with a creditable command of fusha and with visible passion. Perhaps the lone experimental touch was the use of a video screen to stage Macduff’s version of the prophesy of Macbeth’s death. In much of the play, the conception was stagey and the monologues delivered in the textbook style taught at acting schools.
On the other hand, I felt that the insistent classicism of Blood Horse was intended to demonstrate that Iraq did still have theatre, according to cherished old norms that validated Shakespeare in fusha translation as a benchmark of high culture. Those of us who came looking for an experimental performance wanted to see the fragmentation of Iraq dissected on stage, but others in the mostly Iraqi audience cheered the grand Shakespearean performance, perhaps in memory of days when they could go to the theatre in their finery and watch tragedy in measured
cadences rather than the violence now seen on the streets and on television.
At the end of the half-hour performance, audience members who had been clicking away on their digital cameras gave a rousing ovation and rushed onstage to greet the troupe. Many had their pictures taken with the better-known actors and with Shamma. Reporters from the al-Iraqiyya television were among a handful of satellite television crews interviewing the director and cast. There were smiles and hugs all round. At this effusion of national feeling the non-Iraqi critic was something of an outsider. I left, but trust that a party followed and that a good, nostalgic time was had by all.

Iraqi Shakespeare at CIFET

This year's Cairo International Festival of Experimental Theatre will include an Iraqi adaptation of Macbeth.

It's called Blood Horse, presented by the National Acting Troupe (more details as I get them):

Shakespeare’s Macbeth is well known among intellectuals and those interested in theatre. However, we’ve presented here a new view of the play, modernizing the events and making them speak of the reality of our world. We deal here with absolute power, presenting it out of space and time, so we see Shakespeare’s personae out of their worlds, flying in spaces of unknown worlds, surrounded by smoke, fear, and darkness, in a tension that harmonizes with the thematic of the show.