...Drained

Something different for a change...

On Wednesday, Sulayman AlBassam came to give a talk in our department. For those of you who do not recall him. You should know that I am into him because of this and this. Being a genius with good looks adds to the experience of watching his most recent breathtaking play. So, as soon as I found out that he was coming, I had to make sure H and J were coming. Of course, Aj and Sou became the daily unfortunate victims of my excitement;p

I made the effort of looking good that day. I had a presentation which got canceled and two midterms. As soon as I walk into our department after my first midterm, I hear my friends bubbling with excitement. "He's here!" Where? "In Dr. Ebtehal's office!" Great. I was dared by Sou to go into the office and remind him that I ran after him previously, and so, I did. He was very sweet about remembering me. It was good meeting him formally after that incident;p

Soon, we were sitting in rows facing him. And he spoke. He spoke about plays as performances and not literature. He spoke about the journey from text into performance. He spoke about bringing actors of different backgrounds. He spoke about ideological intolerance and the inability to accept the other. He spoke about their aim to correct misapprehensions. He spoke about being careful not to naively provide a feast for ideological enemies. He spoke about forty days in a Jabriya basement to produce a play that will change many people's point of view of the Arab world.

AlBassam explained the difficulty of an Arab director being approached by the Royal Shakespeare Company to produce an adaptation of Richard III. He proceeded to explain that Richard III is seen as a symbol of evil. The character was an epitome of ugliness, but not in his play. He showed us clips of the phenomenal performace along with pictures which were displayed on stage. One of the pictures he perfectly described as a portrayal of "modernity offset by tradition."

He also spoke about the importance of live music in his plays. He explained that the "presence of live music adds to the pleasure of the spectacle", and I find that true. He gave examples of merged musical traditions. There was a lot he said. It was an inspiration, but I choose to keep part of the experience to myself.

Although Richard III: An Arabian Tragedy plays as a Kuwaiti piece, there was a local disappointment in regards to the nights it was played and the audience. There is a thirst for culture and serious drama. I just got back from The Pirates of Penzance, and I only saw thirteen Kuwaitis (yes, I counted). The opera was great. I leave you with pictures.