Two Plays for Gaza
T907361966
Archive :: production:T907361966, play:S211913345, venue:V309
Seven Jewish Children/The Trainer
Seven Jewish Children - Caryl Churchill's 10-minute play about the attack on Gaza was first performed at the Royal Court Theatre in February 2009. This is what Michael Billington had to say about it: "The work consists of seven cryptic scenes in which parents, grandparents and relatives debate how much children should know and not know. It moves, implicitly, from the Holocaust to the foundation of the state of Israel through the sundry Middle East wars up to the invasion of Gaza. At first, the advice indicates the deep divisions within Israel ("Tell her they want to drive us into the sea" / "Tell her they don't"); at the end, it becomes a ruthless justification for self-preservation ("Tell her we're the iron fist now, tell her it's the fog of war, tell her we won't stop killing them till we're safe.") Churchill, I'm sure, would not deny the existence of fierce external, and internal, Jewish opposition to the attack on Gaza. What she captures, in remarkably condensed poetic form, is the transition that has overtaken Israel, to the point where security has become the pretext for indiscriminate slaughter. Avoiding overt didacticism, her play becomes a heartfelt lamentation for the future generations who will themselves become victims of the attempted military suppression of Hamas." The Guardian.
The Trainer - After Keith Burstein’s opera, with a libretto by Dic Edwards tells the story of Leila, a young Palestinian, who considers becoming a suicide bomber, but who then renounces violence to find an alternative way to fight oppression. The opera offers a vision of peace to the world. This multi-media play is set in a posh gym in the bowels of a gentlemen’s club frequented by Court of Appeal judges whose trainer is Leila, a young Palestinian who is studying law. Punctuated with excerpts from the opera, news footage from Gaza and inane Breakfast TV, the play not only deals with the Burstein bankruptcy, but attacks the absurdities of the UK terror laws and satirically warns of sleepwalking towards a police state. It delivers a darkly comical comment on the justice system, while at the same time highlighting the struggles taking place both in Gaza and nearer home to defend humanity from barbarism. A benefit evening for the Gaza Music School & Stop The War Coalition with special foreword by Tony Benn
