[NEohioPAL] REVIEW: The Near East at Canton Players Guild

[Tom Wachunas]

Communicable Complexities
By Tom Wachunas
 
For the Lord your God
is a consuming fire, a jealous God. –Deuteronomy 4:24 –
“If you want to make
God laugh, tell him your plans.”  - Woody
Allen -
 
    In these troubled
times, nothing can bring a civilized discourse among intelligent folk to a
grinding halt (if not a violent altercation) quite like the volatile mix of
politics and religion. Our moral and intellectual righteousness can be so
easily stoked into raging fires of confrontational rage that, in the wake of
our most impassioned arguments, we leave each other vexed, perplexed, or worse,
literally breathless.
 
    While the
narrative scope of The Near East, the
play by Alex Lewin that had its regional premiere on March 30 at The Players
Guild Theatre in Canton, fits squarely within this ideological framework,
neither its content nor its intent should be regarded as strident preaching or
didactic editorializing. And yet, for all the uncompromisingly explosive
questions it so boldly presents (offering little in the way of hard and fast
truths or answers), the play is as gently edifying as it is enlightening.
 
    Here’s a synopsis.
American Jewish archaeologist and atheist, Ken Schneider, reluctantly agrees to
assist on a highly controversial and secretive mission in Saudi Arabia headed
by Arab woman scholar, Aisha Ghazali, to uncover the legendary Umm al-Kitab,
the “Mother of Books”, believed to be written by the hand of God, and
pre-dating the Koran. Aisha’s brother, Umar, is secretly gay, distrusting of
Ken, fiercely protective of his sister, and possibly aligned with a radical
Islamic group. Amid his dealings with these and other characters in the story,
Ken, already struggling with the death of his son and loss of his wife,
communes with the ghost of an Egyptian boy who acts as a kind of spiritual
guide as he confronts his pain and his beliefs in an unstable landscape of
faith and mysticism, love and loss, terror and hope. 
 
    The play is a
co-production of Northern Michigan University’s (NMU) Forest Roberts Theatre
and the New Play Conservatory program of the Canton Players Guild. It is
directed by Ansley Valentine, NMU Director of Theatre, who brought his NMU cast
to Canton (with the exception of Michael Gatto, who plays Hasan, Aisha’s stern
and loyal bodyguard) for this all- too- short run. Valentine has clearly
accomplished a masterful feat in sharpening his actors’ capacity for getting
inside their characters and delivering electrifying performances, startling in
their intimacy and credibility.
 
   As Ken, Ryan
Sitzberger is at once cocky and insecure, convincingly authoritative yet
uncomfortable in his own skin. When he and Aisha, played by Taylor Kulju, butt
heads and souls, the palpable emotional sparks have far-reaching consequences.
Kulju’s portrayal of the outlaw scholar is equally dualistic – powerfully self-assured
yet painfully vulnerable. Her dialogues are often fast, furious, and fueled by
a readiness to be a martyr not for Islamic fundamentalism, but human dignity.
Michael Skrobeck, playing Umar, her gentle-hearted timid brother, is similarly
riveting and even frightening as he urgently seeks answers and assurances that
never seem to come. His situation is made all the more murky and dangerous by
his intimate relationship with the duplicitous British diplomat, Michael
Kennedy, played with a chilling sort of relish by James Porras II.
 
    In fact all the
cast members here have completely immersed themselves in their characters with
astonishing intensity. Nowhere is that immersion more convincingly bittersweet
and endearing than in the character of Ahmed, the ghost of a 13 year-old boy
who was horrifically abused and executed while his father did nothing to save
him. In that role, Luke Woolley is nothing short of magical.
 
    Regardless of your
religious affiliations or political leanings, you’d have to be hopelessly
cold-hearted and/or ruthlessly cynical not to be unmoved by the searing pathos
of this story and its utterly human characters as they struggle to embrace
their cultural and spiritual dilemmas. It’s hardly a simplistic or
stereotypical Arab vs. Westerner scenario.  Still the play reminds me, as someone with far
more than a casual interest in Christian theology, that if our plans can make
God laugh, they can just as well make Him cry.  
 
   The Near East –  2 remaining shows are tonight, March 31 at 8
p.m. and tomorrow (Sunday April 1) at 2:30 p.m. in the Players Guild Theatre,
1001 Market Avenue N., in Canton. Tickets $10 
   Call the Box Office
at (330) 453 – 7617, or  www.playersguildtheatre.com
   For other reviews
and commentaries by Tom Wachunas on the performing and visual arts in the
greater Canton area, please visit his blog, ARTWACH, at  www.artwach.blogspot.com 
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