Nabra Nelson: Salaam Aleykum! Welcome to Kunafa and Shay, a podcast produced for HowlRound Theatre Commons, a free and open platform for theatremakers worldwide. Kunafa and Shay discusses and analyzes modern and historic Center Jap and North Africa, or MENA, theatre from throughout the area.
Marina Johnson: I am Marina.
Nabra: And I am Nabra.
Marina: And we’re your hosts.
Nabra: Our identify, Kunafa and Shay, invitations you into the dialogue in one of the best ways we all know how, with complicated and scrumptious sweets like kunafa, and completely heat tea, or in Arabic, “shay.”
Marina: Kunafa and Shay is a spot to share experiences, concepts, and generally to have interaction with our variations. In every nation within the Arab world, you may discover kunafa made in another way. In that method, we additionally lean into the variety, complexity, and strong flavors of MENA theatre. We deliver our personal views, analysis, and particular visitors, in an effort to begin a dialogue and encourage additional studying and dialogue.
Nabra: In our third season, we spotlight queer MENA and SWANA, or Southwest Asian North African theatremakers, and dive into the breadth of queerness current of their artwork.
Marina: Yalla. Seize your tea. The shay is excellent.
Nabra: In earlier seasons, we have now explored the intersection of womanhood and MENA narratives in theatre. This season, we additional complicate notions of MENA womanhood by exploring the extra intersections of queerness in femme MENA theatremaking. Becoming a member of us this episode are two queer Lebanese femme theatremakers based mostly within the US. We’ll focus on how intersectional identities present up within the two artists’ work and life, and be taught extra concerning the social ambiance for femme MENA theatre artists in Lebanon and the US.
Sarah Bitar is a Brooklyn-based, trilingual actor, vocalist, author, and activist from Lebanon, and graduate of the Stella Adler Studio. In her performing, instructing, and advising, she goals to discover the completely different sides of the human expertise in its depth and absurdity. Choose credit embrace Stockade, produced by Varonique Movies, Like Salt produced by Cinephilia, Very Large Shot produced by Cabrit Movies, Glimpse Revolution produced by Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, Hail Elisha produced by LAByrinth Theater Firm, and Love’s Labour’s Misplaced produced by Irvington Shakespeare Firm.
She’s a part of the performing firm on the Mercury Retailer, a startup area that gives theatremakers our bodies, area, and time to look at their work. There, she has labored with many administrators, together with Will Frears, Kareem Fahmy, Will Davis, Nikki Maggio, and others. She was a recipient of the NYFA Metropolis Artists Corps Grant in 2021.
Marina: Lama El Homaïssi is a Lebanese trilingual actor, singer, author, and voiceover artist at the moment based mostly in New York Metropolis, the place she’s an artist-in-residence on the SHIM:NYC Residency, and can be a member of the Joe’s Pub Working Group 2022-2023. Lama started her profession in leisure working for years as a tv author in Lebanon at Sony Footage Tv Arabia, Talpa Center East, and ITV Studios ME, earlier than pursuing her MFA in musical theatre at Boston Conservatory at Berklee.
Along with performing, Lama served as a analysis and translation assistant on Daniel and Patrick Lazour’s We Stay in Cairo, a brand new musical directed by Obie Award-winning director, Taibi Magar that premiered at American Repertory Theater in 2019. She later went on to work as a dramaturgy and publications assistant for ART’s 2019-2020 season, and was concerned as a storyteller and singer in a number of neighborhood engagements and training occasions in each Boston and New York Metropolis.
She collaborated with the Lazours and Ramy Essam on lyrics for the track, “Tahrir is Now,” on the album “Flap My Wings (Songs from We Stay in Cairo).” Lama’s writing has additionally been featured within the Harvard Gazette, Brooklyn Rail, and in her essay, “On Storytelling as an Act of Survival,” revealed in HowlRound’s Theatre Commons.
Good day. We’re so excited to have you ever with us right this moment. Earlier than we soar into bigger conversations, we have heard your bios, however we might love to listen to, what are you engaged on proper now, and are there upcoming tasks that you simply’re additionally actually enthusiastic about that you simply need to and may share? Who desires to start out?
Lama El Homaïssi: I am going to go. Hello, my identify is Lama El Homaïssi. I’m an actor, singer, author from Beirut, Lebanon. I have been within the US about six years now. I got here right here in 2017 to get my MFA from Boston Conservatory at Berklee in musical theatre, as a result of I’ve a background in movie. After graduating, I at all times discovered myself in between being each a author and an actor. Marina, I believe it was you who stated that what makes you need to be a playwright is the dearth of voices and the dearth of possibly illustration of very particular MENA identities, together with femme identities. I at all times really feel like that is what fuels me to maintain writing. After which once I get bored with writing, I am like, “Ah, okay. I ought to do extra auditions,” after which I am going to audition for components. And a number of them being Center Jap, with all due respect to all of the work that is on the market being produced, I do not at all times really feel represented by these descriptions. After which I am like, “All proper, again to the drafting board. I’ll proceed writing.”
So I by no means tire of both factor, I simply discover myself bouncing backwards and forwards. I simply really feel like it’s an immense privilege to have the ability to have a voice proper now, simply traditionally talking, contextually talking, and to not use it proper now simply looks like I’d be doing an awesome disservice to a number of teams, together with… I simply really feel a accountability. In order that was a great distance of intro-ing what I am engaged on proper now.
As we converse, I’ve a present arising at Joe’s Pub. It is a cabaret storytelling and music evening. It is referred to as Not Harem Materials and it options vignettes, authentic songs, and covers of songs, and so they’re all underneath the umbrella of a response to one thing an agent as soon as stated to me in a gathering, that I used to be “not harem materials.” So it is simply sort of placing that in query and placing the stereotype and these monoliths in query.
After which the opposite challenge I am engaged on is an authentic musical, a rock musical set in a Beirut dingy music bar, referred to as Radio Beirut. And I am creating these items underneath the Secure Haven Incubator for Musicians. It is a residency program that I have been in. It is run by Inventive Freedom Initiative, Tamizdat, and Westbeth Artist Housing, in addition to Joe’s Pub. I have been creating these two tasks concurrently for the final two years.
Marina: These are so thrilling. We’ll positively come again and soar into them extra. I additionally identical to the concept that there is a cycle or a circle that type of has emerged, of the writing to auditioning to again to writing. It feeds into one another from necessity in numerous methods.
Lama: Sure.
Marina: Sarah, how about you? What are you engaged on?
Sarah Bitar: Effectively, moreover scheduling doing nothing into my agenda, this fall, I’m working once more on the Mercury Retailer, which is my favourite area in New York Metropolis. It is in Gowanus, Brooklyn. It is an experimental developmental area for administrators, and I work there as an actor servicing completely different tasks in growth, which may be very thrilling as a result of we get to sort out questions and experiment with stuff with out the stress of manufacturing. Whereas among the administrators… They’ve completely different packages, however among the administrators get mentorship and steerage, and so I have been studying lots about directing and why I used to be very pissed off on previous tasks, and understanding the significance of a director on a challenge really, which is the chief and the vision-carrier, and the significance of choosing tasks the place I belief the philosophy and the articulation of that specific director, and surrendering as an actor to that course of. In any other case, it is not enjoyable for anyone. Yeah.
And to piggy off of that, I discover myself being very selective concerning the issues that I need to audition in. Or past, for that matter, now that I’ve hit my early thirties, I really feel like, oh, I’ve, I do not know, ridden the wave of “Go, go, go, do, do, do, be a part of every little thing,” and now I am actually being respectful of constructing area for the issues that I really need, together with writing additionally.
We choose up our writers’ group tomorrow that I began with Yusuf Gad and Laila Abdo, and it got here out of the OuLuLi group on Fb. We began our first session in final February, and we’re selecting it up tomorrow. And that is the one time I do really write for a selected challenge, when I’ve accountability and inspiration from others. And it is a actually wonderful combined group of screenwriters, playwrights, essayists, journalists. Yeah, and so I believe it is an awesome area to be taught from all these individuals who do have writing expertise, and myself who by no means bought any writing coaching however simply have the necessity to specific one thing. By the best way, me and Lama met about-
Lama: Twelve years in the past.
Sarah: Twelve years in the past.
Marina: Wow. Wait, inform us about this assembly.
Lama: If I am not mistaken, we met at a unofficial Disney musical theatre workshop masterclass. As a result of in Lebanon, there’s positively music, and there is positively theatre, however that style of musical theatre that is so particular to the West or to Broadway or Disney, it is not coaching that you’ll find simply.
Sarah: Though it was very current within the sixties, seventies, and eighties. Al Rahbani, you already know.
Lama: For positive. However see, I do not consider that as Western.
Sarah: Yeah, fa3lan.
Lama: And yeah, we met at that workshop.
Sarah: Yeah, there isn’t any belting, and…
Lama: Yeah, completely completely different, which I like to speak about. And in addition, I do know we’re happening a tangent, but-
Marina: We should always speak about all of this.
Lama: The shift from the Rahbanis to Ziad Rahbani.
Sarah: I wished to say one final thing about what I am engaged on, and it is the fruits of what I’ve labored on two years in the past. So we’re premiering our characteristic movie, Stockade, at Woodstock Movie Pageant on the finish of this month. In order that’s not work; it is simply the reaping of a very long time of labor.
Marina: I guess. Very thrilling. For these of us who cannot be there in individual, is there ever a digital choice, or will we simply should be affected person and we’ll see it when it comes our method?
Sarah: Yeah. I believe hopefully, that is solely the start of the competition circuit, and it will make its approach to completely different cities and cities and possibly into an internet screening someday down the best way.
Marina: I am going to preserve my eyes peeled. Sure, you have given us an awesome place to start out this dialog. Will we need to begin with musical theatre? It looks like that was the final thread that was type of-
Lama: I believe Lebanese theatre, after which we will contact upon musical theatre.
Marina: That sounds nice.
Lama: As a result of I really feel like opening it as much as theatre is likely to be… We speak lots, Sarah and I, about how a lot we miss the theatre scene again residence and the ways in which it is completely different. As a result of it’s completely different. It’s completely different in a number of methods. And Sarah, I will put the stress on you to explain precisely the way it’s completely different.
Sarah: Effectively, I left in 2016, so I additionally have not been immersed for some time. I comply with from distant. However earlier than I left, there was Zoukak, which remains to be round, and there was Lina Abyad who’s additionally nonetheless making wonderful work, and Lina Khoury. And sorry if I am lacking anyone, however that is what involves the highest of my head. And naturally, Faek El Homaïssi, who’s a stupendous pantomime, and I do not know if I ought to say this, but additionally Lama’s father.
Marina: Wait. Say extra, say extra!
Lama: Thanks for the shout-out.
Sarah: Sure. I believe Lama would know-
Lama: Yeah, each time it is my flip, I am going to positively inform you about him.
Sarah: Cool. So I really feel like there’s completely different genres. Camille Salameh did a number of theatre, and the moshwara, and it was concerning the working class, center class. There’s, in fact, the satirical theatre of Ziad El Rahbani. It is a very fast overview. And I believe Lina Abyad may be very théâtre engagé, specializing in girls’s feminist theatre, home violence. She did a spread of stuff. However I noticed a play of hers right here at NYU really final 12 months, which I used to be very enthusiastic about, referred to as Amrika, and it was about all the ladies which have migrated on the flip of the century, largely girls, all the ladies which have migrated.
Lama: In Little Syria, proper?
Sarah: Sure. From the Damascus area to the US. And certainly one of them was a jewellery maker, and one other one was a politician who was advocating for preserving the best way we gown and our traditions, and really fascinating. It was very visually stunning. There was a ship scene, and the curtains initially that had been turned to mundane actions that girls do on daily basis, like fold garments or iron. That was actually thrilling to see that.
I really feel it was the primary play in New York Metropolis that I noticed about that a part of the world that wasn’t written or catered for a white viewers in an fascinating method, as a result of it simply instructed the story. And that’s one thing that I like to consider. Past identities and identifications, what is the story, and the way are we telling it in a skillful and theatrical method, if it is for the theatre, and cinematic method? Yeah, I do know that Hammana Artist Home can be doing an fascinating initiative. There’s puppetry, critical puppeteers, in addition to the Dakroub brothers.
So I’d say, every little thing that primarily… To begin with, theatre in Lebanon is certainly a luxurious in, sadly, what folks undergo each day to outlive. However on the identical time, I am very impressed that theatre even exists, as a result of there’s actually no funding from the federal government in any respect, it is all private initiatives, there isn’t any reward on any degree.
Marina: And simply to the touch on what you simply stated, thanks for giving such an outline, as a result of it is so essential. And we have talked earlier than on the podcast about how there’s usually a burden on MENA or on SWANA people to write down tales that then are actually both palatable or have a number of rationalization to white audiences, and so it is refreshing to have these moments of, “No, that is simply the story.” And Adam additionally talked on this season about how generally it is okay simply that it is not written for you, and you will nonetheless get lots out of it even if you happen to’re not the audience of it. So I like listening to that, too.
Lama: I wished so as to add one thing, too, that Sarah and I at all times speak about, is, we had been evaluating how adapting to the New York theatre scene or the way it feels to be within the New York theatre scene, versus the Beirut scene. And I believe one huge factor to make distinct and clear is that, you understand how there’s type of a manufacturing or money-making machine, and even the best way we begin to consider placing one thing on its toes, there’s a number of concentrate on monetary funding and producers and backing, and generally it might have an effect on what will get produced or why we’re telling the story right this moment or all these issues. In Lebanon, it is a number of self-production, otherwise you’ll get a grant from a company like AFAC or Mophradat, after which determine the remainder your self. You may stroll away really with losses, however you are paying 100 {dollars} to every of your pals only for having the ability to do it for 2 weeks.
You personally stroll as much as the theatre area your self, and also you go, “Do you might have time on this calendar?” And also you’re speaking to 1 different individual, and also you’re determining… I do not know if that is so for everyone, however I really feel prefer it would not really feel gatekeep-y when you’re… Perhaps a draw back is that we do not get, there is not assist from the federal government, or not ample. There aren’t actually these huge producer sorts which might be funneling cash into this, as a result of it is not a method that we have been making revenue from tourism in Lebanon.
So there’s concentrate on different issues. There’s promoters bringing huge acts to concert events and issues like that. That is positively current in that method. However the place I used to be going with that’s that, as a playwright and as a creator, you are considering lots much less about product and cash and viewers, and also you’re considering extra about core, and also you’re enthusiastic about what’s it that is itching you a lot that it’s a must to say it proper now, or as my father says, he is like, “I am pregnant, and I’ve to provide start to this factor despite the fact that it is not financially a good suggestion proper now.” So what’s going to push you to that time the place you are going to endure a loss, however you actually… Why are we nonetheless making theatre? There is a purpose.
After which the opposite factor I wished to say is, Sarah and I are related in age. Hope that is okay to say. However I used to be born in 1991, which was the primary 12 months out of our Civil Battle, which had begun in 1975. So we are also born out of a time the place there are huge… Thematically, a number of issues I’ve seen within the narratives from pre-Civil Battle to through the Civil Battle and post-Civil Battle, they’re very completely different. We positively grew up type of reckoning with this concept that our nation had simply gone by means of that and that there was simply an acceptance that issues had been being rebuilt and that, economically talking, it was in a selected state after such an extended Civil Battle.
Then, in addition to thematically, I grew up with a number of retellings of the Civil Battle. And our expertise, I really feel like I did not begin to unpack or speak about it in my follow, as a result of there’s a lot area given to this Civil Battle within the public conscience, and it is so current that I really feel like I did not start to unpack every little thing till I used to be method older.
After which when it comes to the performs that we watch, I believe one other factor Sarah and I at all times speak about is, it is so completely different than Western theatre, I believe, as a result of there is not the specter of needing to promote a product and generate profits, there’s extra experimental theatre. I believe that alleviates a number of the liberty that an artist can have. There’s a number of experimental theatre. Earlier than Ziad Rahbani started writing his musicals, his father’s, a number of the themes had been of sort of an ideal village. What are the societal norms? You have bought your dangerous man, you have bought your hero, the love curiosity, and a refrain of an ensemble of those villagers singing again. What are these societal norms? Like, “Oh no, she spoke to somebody with out the presence of her father.” So reinforcing a great utopic time, nostalgic for an period of Lebanon.
After which when Ziad started composing and writing his performs, you could possibly positively see a shift as we had been now within the Civil Battle. I consider Bennesbeh Labokra Chou, which is certainly one of his musicals. It is set fully in a bar, and it is about these patrons that come and go. They usually’re singing concerning the scenario, they’re singing about residing each day, making an attempt to make it. After which the query that it is asking is type of, what this desperation goes to push this bar proprietor to do in his private life, with out freely giving the ending. However you are positively going from a much bigger utopic, “these are the village beliefs,” to a extra gritty, sensible, not likely stunning picture.
Marina: I simply actually admire the context that you’ve got given to Lebanese theatre. We have had Zeina Daccache speak about some Lebanese theatre, and Sahar Assaf, and so we have had some dips into actually enthusiastic about theatre in Lebanon from completely different views, however I really feel such as you gave a very concise overview actually shortly. So thanks for that. I believe that is an enormous profit to all of us to get to listen to.
I positively need to head into the music path in a minute, however I additionally simply need to consider among the issues that you simply introduced up about how, in your lifetimes, the context of theatre has modified, the tales, that theatre telling has modified. And I additionally simply, I believe, need to tie that into what all of us deliver to our artwork. As a result of we deliver our identities, however you even have… You have lived in Lebanon, you are residing within the States, so that you’re bringing all of this context with you to the artwork that you simply’re making now, with MENA identities, with femme identities, with queer identities. This stuff all play into… Sarah, you had been speaking about how you have turn out to be extra selective over time with roles, and that is additionally a part of an identification that is turning into both extra assured or extra snug, or simply, “I am in my thirties, I do not need to do that anymore,” the opposite sorts of gigs. However I’d love to speak concerning the ways in which your identification play into the artwork that you simply’re making and even the conversations that you simply need to have.
Sarah: Wow. Whilst you had been speaking, I used to be like, “I do not know, possibly you and I ought to get collectively and construct a course right here within the US about theatre or one thing.”
Marina: I’d be the primary scholar, promise. That might be wonderful.
Sarah: Okay. I will begin with, I am a little bit of a insurgent towards identification artwork in a method, or the best way by which the theatre is heading proper now. I am extra of a committer to an excellent story, irrespective of who’re the folks in it. And it took me a while, arriving right here, being a foreigner, present as a foreigner on this area, having to undergo visa stuff and nonetheless going by means of visa stuff, and expressing myself in, not a second, however a 3rd language, and in addition being from this very difficult place that’s so tough to sum up. And in addition it is a very faraway place geographically, and folks are usually very, very ignorant about, like, “Oh, Lebanon, what’s that?” And it is positive. It is positive. Like, “Okay, cool. Yeah. It is a very tiny nation and two oceans and a continent away.”
Proper now, I am engaged on producing, for instance, a play by Sarah Kane. It is referred to as, Cleansed. I am placing it up hopefully with a… After all, I will say “hopefully.” That is a really Lebanese factor to say. Inshallah.
Lama: Inshallah.
Nabra: Inshallah.
Marina: Inshallah.
Sarah: Individuals do not get it once I say “hopefully.” They’re like, “What do you imply?” It is simply getting a buy-in from the facility up there within the sky someplace.
Again to Cleansed. It is a very feminist… If we need to give it that label. I actually have bother with labels. But it surely’s a narrative of this lady who arrives in an establishment for undesirables, and there she meets the individual in cost who’s the most important abuser and who allegedly killed her brother. And she or he’s there slowly reworking into the physique of her brother. And so there’s that transition, and, with out sticking these labels on it, it is a trans play. It is questioning energy and the voices, the violent voices that we internalize, and the way we relinquish our energy after we imagine that there is one thing flawed with us and in search of assist and giving energy, in search of assist from one other individual and the way they’ll abuse that energy. So it’s extremely related and really darkish, and there is a number of brutal moments within the play. And in order that’s one thing I am interested by.
I not too long ago auditioned for a really fascinating position for a characteristic movie, actually final week, written by a Lebanese American. And it is the primary script that I really learn that’s simply taking a stab on the wealthy Lebanese folks. And the character is raised as a princess, and her household just isn’t respecting primarily her sort of refugee husband-to-be who can be a physician. However she provides him an recommendation to say his dominance by really refusing to open the door or doing the issues that her mom shouts at him, which I discover very humorous, with the undertones of Triangle of Disappointment and Parasite. These had been the reference for the movie. And I believed that was fairly enjoyable, and people sorts of tales excite me. As a result of it is like, the one position I auditioned for earlier than that, that Lama refused to audition for, was, it is like a rewriting of The Odyssey that was all refugee characters, and once more, “The woe is me, the woe is me.”
And I used to be like, “Okay, it is an Off-Broadway present. I am going to receives a commission, no matter. I am going to journey.” I am justifying each single purpose as to why I ought to audition. “I am going to follow performing, blah, blah, blah.” After which I get there, and the casting director is white, the lady who wrote it’s white, the director is white. All of the 4 characters should not American. I do not know why. I do not know why. I do not know what… And it is positive. I am not saying that American folks cannot write about non-American characters, that is not it. But it surely’s so ignorant, and it tokenizes these characters which have became, in a method, archetypes, on this half. And it is boring. It is boring. I do not need to be in one other struggle. I am recovering. And I additionally haven’t got the emotional bandwidth to even be in a play that’s about that. It does one thing to me, particularly when it is handled on this very honest, dumb, uncritical method, the place, once more, there isn’t any story craft. It is not a common story.
As a result of I can see how struggle is interesting as a story. There is a battle, and there is somebody who wins, I do not know, and there is destruction. Perhaps there’s one thing interesting about that. It is thrilling. All of us cease to have a look at a automotive burning. However there’s one other sort of narrative, that… I learn this stunning essay by Ursula Ok. Le Guin a few weeks in the past, about tales as carriers and the shift that we have to make from the hunter’s sort of narrative, of, “And he twisted his spear into the mammoth, and the blood spurted it onto his face,” to a different sort of narrative, she says, with beginnings that haven’t any endings and tales which have extra methods than conflicts. She talks about tales as a connective endeavor, the place there isn’t any hero that saves or hunts or no matter, however it’s an internet that’s being put collectively by so many various folks.
Sorry, and the very last thing I will say on that’s that I believed that the Pakistani movie, Joyland by Saim Sadiq, that had many awards and I believe a number of visibility, which I am very enthusiastic about, actually achieved that fantastically. There was the daddy and the son and the spouse and the sister-in-law, and all of their struggles and the way they affected one another, and there isn’t any protagonist. They’re all creating this story collectively. And it was very spectacular to see how that might be achieved. And that is a film, so if folks want to…
Nabra: And Lama, I felt like a number of issues had been sparking for you whereas Sarah was sharing. I noticed you taking notes. I find it irresistible.
Lama: Oh, yeah. I’ve a really expressive face. I wished to say that the entire thing that took us to Lebanese theatre was Sarah mentioning my dad, after which I utterly forgot to speak about him. So mainly, we had been speaking about Lebanese theatre and the way there’s a number of self-production, or not a number of institutional backing, assist, or governmental. And I grew up in a theatremaking family due to my dad.
So my father is Faek El Homaïssi. He began out as a pantomime, however it positively reworked into experimental theatre utilizing pantomime, somewhat than the best way that you’d think about it classically. He studied in France after which moved again to Lebanon. And rising up, I used to be behind the scenes of a number of the performs and kids’s musicals that my father labored on. Considered one of them was Kello Males El Zayba’, and plenty of others to return. And it was a household affair. My dad can be the creator and performer. My mother’s a painter in positive arts, so she would do the posters, generally puppets, no matter masks had been required. After which my brother and I’d simply do ushering. Day of, we might simply be there. After which as I grew older, I bought into stage make-up, and I began doing my father’s face, which was actually particular and in addition sort of scary, simply seeing him needing to focus in these ultimate moments, and I am identical to, “Wait, maintain on.” He is like, “Please, please, I have to go now.”
So positively being a father working along with your teenage child doing all your make-up was an expertise for him as properly. However I positively noticed how each feat started and ended for each certainly one of his productions. So I bought to see a number of the beginnings and behind the scenes of doing all that. And he was additionally in Bil Nesbe la Boukra Shoo by Ziad Rahbani. He was in that musical that I used to be speaking about.
Sarah: He is wonderful. And he is an extended, lengthy life educator. I studied with him, and he nonetheless teaches, I believe, on the Lebanese College the place I did my undergrad. However he taught, I do not know, for forty years or one thing.
I really feel like if it had been as much as us, we would not select to re-experience and re-traumatize ourselves each single time we make theatre.
Lama: He is a drama professor. Yeah. Yeah, he has positively had an extended life and profession in theatre and tradition work in Lebanon and the Center East typically. And I really feel very, very fortunate to have grown up round that and with that.
And now I wished to additionally contact upon, we had been speaking about these intersections of identities. I really feel like for me, while you’re in Lebanon, all people has gone by means of the identical factor, and we’re simply all possibly expressing that in our work or talking about issues that don’t have anything to do with what we have skilled. And also you’re presenting it to an viewers of predominantly different Lebanese folks. And so there’s lots much less of contextualizing that it’s a must to do or educating that it’s a must to do. And on the subject of anticipating your viewers, it is an entire completely different ball sport than it’s for me right here.
I seen that after immigrating, it was one thing I had by no means actually thought of, however simply how a lot I’d be affected as a author, how a lot considering I’d do about, “Oh, okay.” However I sort of need to take a step again, and I’ve to start out my story slightly bit behind so I can contextualize. Or I am utilizing a primary era Lebanese American who’s sort of parachuting going to Beirut on a journey of her personal to try to detangle her identification. However I really feel like I solely began to consider these theatric modes and strategies in writing to assist an American viewers. I am not saying something… I am simply saying that possibly they’re very unfamiliar with sure issues, or probably sure beliefs they’ve concerning the Center East are both incorrect or is likely to be true for Northern Africa, however not likely for the Levantine area. So I positively seen that I’m extra conscious of my identification as a result of I am having to spell it out as properly.
After which the best way I really feel is that additionally I’ve simply auditioned for lots of girls in misery, a number of components of girls who’re both offstage, they seem for slightly bit, they’re in misery, they don’t seem to be a part of the principle story, they’re type of simply there as an instrument. The principle character is likely to be an Arab cis male, hetero, no matter, however we’re simply sort of a part of the background. And I do not need to say that it is at all times deliberately dangerous. I believe generally it is a method of letting the viewers member go, “Oh, have sympathy.” You must have sympathy for these girls however on the identical time, that sort of sufferer field can take away a lot from femme company, or simply any sort of…
After which we speak about this within the US within the context of a Bechdel Take a look at. It is sort of related, however then including additionally lots to it of stereotypes about Arabs, or folks simply assuming that, to ensure that them to make Center Jap theatre, you do not want creatives on the within of it. That is the aspect I used to be saying, is, you may simply actually inform earlier than you even present as much as the audition what sort of scenario it’s, as a result of there is a sure tokenization within the language and even simply the subject. I really feel like if it had been as much as us, we would not select to re-experience and re-traumatize ourselves each single time we make theatre. But it surely’s additionally an essential factor to speak about. But when it is coming from a Center Jap artistic who desires to speak concerning the Battle, it is usually completely different than somebody American who’s Caucasian and needs to speak concerning the Battle.
Sarah: We do not write performs, habibti, we do not produce performs, we simply write feedback.
