Complex answers
My first theatre experience answered a question that has perplexed me often, “Why Jihad?” The answer is complex, for it is the story of friendship and betrayal, of lost dreams and love’s resurrection, of revenge and hope, of love and hate, of selfishness and patriotism, of weddings and funerals, of heaven and hell, and all that lies in between.
The tale of a staid engineer Marwan and two Bohemian doctors Salim and Luma was sprinkled with a liberal dose of sarcasm, wit and political irony. A triangular love story and a harrowing account of persecution later, the line between the tortured and the torturer blurs. Salim gets the girl and a story for his book leaving Marwan to ruminate poignantly about his motherland, ‘A country found, and lost again’.
ADVERTISEMENT
Very real
The play progressively grows on one as the characters as well as the circumstances in which they live becomes apparent. It takes one through the tragedies and atrocities as well as the simple pleasures of a group of people living in strife-torn Iraq. The director seamlessly blends the past and present. The ingenious multi-level stage sets, lighting and the accents add a lot of reality. A play such as this presents us with stark reality which, most of us, would otherwise only read about. I judge the impact of a play if it continues to linger in my head the next morning. Baghdad Wedding did just that.
ADVERTISEMENT
Kudos to the entire cast and production crew who, unfortunately, were left nameless to us!
K.V. Siddhartha,New Thillai Nagar
Minimalist, but powerful
Baghdad Wedding showed us a peek of the life of young students in the U.K., and of love, bisexuality, war, brutality, religion and politics. The actors played their roles flawlessly. The minimalist set design and the effective lighting gave a powerful sense of the terrain even though the play shifted from London to Baghdad and a feel of an Iraq that is in a state of transition. The music was soothing too. We appreciated the use of a dummy machine gun. The director could have probably used dummy cigarettes to avoid turning the audience into passive smokers in an air-conditioned auditorium.
Jayashree V.Murthy, Trichy Road