"Whoever gets back to the front door first without getting shot,
wins"
Fireworks
Running time: 90 minutes (without interval)
Booking until 14th March
In a nameless
and besieged Palestinian town Lubna and Khalil, 11 and 12 respectively, live
with the consequences of growing up in the middle of a war. Khalil loves the
Ninja Turtles, oscillates between violence and sensitivity, teeters on the brink
of adolescence and perplexes his parents — played with conviction by Nabil
Elouahabi and Shereen Martin.
For her part Lubna feasts on the fireworks that illuminate the night sky.
Except, of course, they’re not fireworks but bombs. She must also deal with her
first period and realising she doesn’t have any proper friends, while her
parents (Sirine Saba and Saleh Bakri) struggle to make sense of the death of
their son. The children are in effect housebound. Everyone around them fears
for their safety, and their psychological wounds fester. By concentrating on
their experience, Dalia Taha’s play offers a refreshingly oblique perspective
on the conflict in Gaza.
Director Richard Twyman elicits poised and tender performances from the younger
cast members (on press night Yusuf Hofri as Khalil and Shakira Riddell-Morales
as Lubna). The result is a painful, unsettling vision of precarious lives.
Labels: Dalia Taha, Eden Nathenson, George Karageorgis, Nabil Elouahabi, Saleh Bakri, Shakira Riddell-Morales, Shereen Martin, Sirine Saba, Yusuf Hofri