The Belfry Theatre’s Crisis of Nerve

The Belfry Theatre was vandalized last month
while the venue was deciding whether to go forward
the production of The Runner.

There is a theory, one to which Curmie subscribes, which suggests that the Dionysian Festival of classical Athens began not really as a religious observance in honor of a demi-god but rather as a means of consolidating the political power of the tyrant Peisistratus.  Whether or not this is true, there is no doubt that by 458 BCE Aeschylus’ Oresteia, widely acclaimed as “the world’s first dramatic masterpiece,” offers commentary on the reforms of the Areopagus enacted by the strategos Ephialtes some three years earlier.

There is no question that since that time the theatre has often—not always, but often—been political.  The 20^th century offered more than a few examples of playwrights and production companies who, often at personal risk, critiqued the power structures around them: Jean-Paul Sartre took on the Nazis; Lorraine Hansberry, racism in the US; Athol Fugard, apartheid; Václav Havel, communism in Eastern Europe.

Not all such efforts were for causes most of us would endorse, of course.  Socialist Realism was a Stalinist policy under which all art had to support The Revolution: not just avoid criticism of the regime, but actively and explicitly endorse it.  More recently, the Freedom Theatre of Jenin (on the occupied West Bank) has been in the news.  A few weeks ago, one of the student organizations at Curmie’s university posted an encomium to the company, which they described as “an example of creating liberating theatre and serving communities through theatrical pedagogy and profound performance.”  

Curmie remembered having written about that theatre a dozen or so years ago (and quoting his post on LiveJournal—yeah, Curmie is old—written several years before that).  If I might quote myself for a moment: “Turns out that the Freedom Theatre was pretty damned proud of having turned out alumni who engaged in armed insurrection, and at least one of whom, a suicide bomber, richly merited description as a terrorist.” 

So no, propagandistic theatre isn’t always a good thing… but, Gentle Reader, engaging with the world is.  Even subtle messages matter.  Under normal circumstances, Aunt Eller’s wish that “the farmer and the cowman can be friends” doesn’t amount to much.  But Oklahoma! hit Broadway after the declaration of war against the Axis powers and before D-Day.  “Territory folks” need to put aside their petty grievances when there’s a guy with a funny mustache who’s far worse than any of your neighbors will ever be.

And now we come to what this little essay is really about.  The Belfry Theatre in Victoria, British Columbia, announced this week that they were not going forward with the production of The Runner, a one-man show written and performed by Canadian playwright/actor Christopher Morris. The theatre’s management says the decision to cancel the performance was “not easy,” but they believed that “Given the current conflict in the Middle East, this is not the time for a play which may further tensions among our community.”

The play has won numerous awards, and was booked last year for a performance at the Spark Festival this March.  I don’t know the play (it’s available on Kindle, if anyone is interested) but some basics of the plot have come out in news reports.  An article in the National Post summarizes thus: “The one-man play focuses on the moral dilemma faced by a volunteer of ZAKA, an Israeli group of mostly Orthodox Jewish men who provide emergency medical rescues.  The character ‘grapples with the political and moral fallout after saving a Palestinian woman’s life — and leaving a fatally wounded Israeli soldier behind,’ Belfry wrote in a description of the play on its website.”  

Other articles suggest that the woman was probably the person responsible for fatally wounding the soldier.  The central character, then, chooses to administer aid to an enemy whose life can be saved rather than an ally who is beyond physical salvation. 

Exactly what stance the play takes is unclear.  The playwright says that he had hoped to provide “the opportunity to come together in a theatre to explore their common humanity, share their grief and perhaps discover a flicker of solace and hope.”  His other statements suggest a sort of naïve pacifism, but that’s a position worthy of critical examination, as well.

It appears that supporters of Israel were more interested in having the production move forward than were supporters of the Palestinian cause.  The collection of letters published on Friday in the Times Colonist show a wide range of responses.  The play is “a period piece replete with colonialist stereotypes” according to one writer.  Another claims that “the sole reason [for the play’s cancellation] is that it is set in Israel. It does not take sides and concerns the human condition in extremity. Some people hate Israel so much that they object to any cultural production that comes from Israel or deals with its issues.”  Yet another writes that “proponents of the cancellation have crossed a line from anti-Zionism to a form of outright anti-Semitism that seeks to hold all Jews collectively responsible for the appalling behaviour of the Israeli government.”

I noted above that scholars are unanimous that the Eumenides, the third play of Aeschylus’s Oresteia trilogy, references the reforms of Ephialtes.  What they can’t agree on, as I learned while researching a paper for a grad seminar 40-ish years ago, is whether Aeschylus approved or disapproved of those changes to the status quo ante.  And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that ambiguity.

More to the point, who cares if the play has a particular point of view?  Many years ago, the great English theatre critic Kenneth Tynan dismissed the relevance of complaints that the plays of Bertolt Brecht were “unfair” to capitalism: “Henry V is unfair to the French; Everyman is unfair to the Devil.”

There seems to be little support for the Belfry’s decision to cancel the production: it’s called “a lamentable act of cowardice” by one correspondent and “an affront to Canadian’s rights and freedoms” by another.  As both a theatre practitioner and a free speech advocate, of course, Curmie agrees that the show should go on as scheduled.  It strikes me that right now is precisely the time to stage of play of this nature.  Provide opportunities for actual discussion before and/or after performances.  Get people talking and, hopefully, listening.  Sing “Kumbaya” together.  (OK, maybe not that last part.)

If the basis for the cancellation was to avoid “tensions,” well, that horse has left the stable and is halfway to Omaha.  I strongly suspect that the cancellation will enflame more passions than the production would have.  It’s possible, of course, that the theatre feared that the vandalism you see in the photograph above might escalate into something physically threatening to the production staff or audience members, in which case caution is certainly appropriate.  That seems rather a stretch, though. 

“Hold[ing] the mirror up to nature” is one of the principal attributes of theatre production, and live theatre’s effect cannot be duplicated by technologically mediated forms like film and television.  Cancelling a production purely for political efficacy is deeply problematic if not inexcusable.  The Belfry Theatre faced a crisis of nerve, and they failed.

Of course, Curmie isn’t the guy who has to figure out how to get that graffiti off the front of his building.

This post is a slightly edited version of one which first appeared as a guest article on Ethics Alarms.

 

The Peacemaker Who Wasn't

I read recently of the assassination (I presume that is the correct term) of Juliano Mer Khamis, described by the AP’s Mohammed Ballas as an “Israeli-Arab actor” who “ran a drama school and a community theater” in the West Bank.

To hear Ballas tell it, Mr. Mer Khamis was quite a guy. The article makes a big deal out of his Israeli Jewish mother and Arab father, and describes his vision of his company, the Freedom Theatre in Jenin, as “a way of restoring normalcy to the town's youth and opening their minds to the world beyond the harshness of their immediate surroundings.” He also must have been courageous, as “[The] theater drew criticism and vandalism from some Palestinians who were suspicious of Mer Khamis, an Israeli citizen, and saw the theater as a threat to their traditions.” Did we mention his Mom was Jewish? And Israeli?

Trouble is, I remembered the name, and I remembered, too, what my investigation of another puff piece on Mer Khamis and the Freedom Theatre revealed a few years ago. The article in question was on on Aljazeera’s website. I link here to a blog piece I wrote on the subject nearly five years ago (N.B., the internal links from that post no longer work). Turns out that the Freedom Theatre was pretty damned proud of having turned out alumni who engaged in armed insurrection, and at least one of whom, a suicide bomber, richly merited description as a terrorist.

Importantly, what I’m talking about here isn’t what the company’s detractors said, or what the theatre admitted sometimes happens. It’s what they included—and still include—on their own website and in their publicity campaigns. The Freedom Theatre, says Mer Khamis on a slickly produced video promotion from last fall, “is a venue to join the Palestinian people in their struggle for liberation.” We see a young boy declare that “freedom to me is the occupation ending and the army leaving.” Shortly thereafter, Mer Khamis quotes a former student, a leader of the Al Aksa Brigade, as not wanting to fight any more in the absence of “real, honest leadership: liberation leadership. We have to build up this leadership from scratch. And to do this, the best way is to start an artistic venue.”

The Freedom Theatre, in other words, is a propaganda outlet, nothing more and nothing less. Their cause may be good—I’ve certainly been critical of some of the Israeli government’s activities with respect to the Palestinians—but Juliano Mer Khamis and his mother alike were political activists first and theatre artists second.

Of course, some of the most significant plays ever produced—from Uncle Tom’s Cabin to the works of Václav Havel and Athol Fugard—were important as much for their political message as for their artistic merit per se. But if the balance tips too far towards efficacy over aesthetics, we find ourselves at socialist realism or the Cultural Revolution. Remember, too, that the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia which ultimately brought Havel himself to the presidency earned that sobriquet in part because of its non-violence. That, to be polite, does not seem to be the goal of the Freedom Theatre. There is a difference between speaking truth to power and throwing bombs at it.

Juliano Mer Khamis should be mourned. He will be missed by many, apparently, including a pregnant wife and two children. But if his murder was politically motivated, as seems to be the current thinking, he was neither an innocent bystander caught in the crossfire nor a pacifist ultimately overwhelmed by the maelstrom of violence swirling around him. He was a combatant as surely as if he were manning a submachine gun himself. Those who agree with his politics and his tactics should be honest about the source of their admiration. He was what he was, and it wasn’t a peace-maker.