Nahda by Sevan K. Greene, Sandpit Arts, Bush Attic, 17 July 2015

An interesting looking production in the Bush Attic; we thought we’d give it a go despite it starting quite early (19:00) on a Friday. Janie made it to mine with bags of time to spare.

Excellent stub for this production on the Bush site, sparing me the trouble to explain it all – click here.

This short piece was really a few sketches presented together, overlapping more in their subject-matter (female and second generation identity) than the stories themselves.

We enjoyed it and were glad we invested the time to see this production.

I hope the Bush use that attic space more after the refurb (I am writing in December 2016). We thought it had great potential for this sort of studio work, much like the Royal Court Upstairs and Hampstead Downstairs.

 

 

Prophet in Exile by Nadim Sawalha, Chelsea Theatre, 8 May 2000

A rare Monday evening visit to the theatre for us. I had booked the day out as a long weekend. Perhaps Janie had intended to do the same, but her diary shows that she treated some patients, engineering it that she ended up in the Kensington & Chelsea area.

We really liked the stuff that little Chelsea Theatre was putting on back then – it had a short flowering of producing the sort of unusual fringe theatre stuff that we like.

This play was basically a biographical piece about Kahlil Gibran, not least the birth of his great work, The Prophet.

This production was very much a family affair for the Sawalha family, with author Nadim appearing in the production, along with brother Nabil and a couple of other Sawalhas; Lara & Omar, in some cases doubling up, playing several smaller parts. Gerald Key played Gibran, Briony Glassco played Mary Haskell and Colin Redgrave directed the production.

This production was previewed in The Standard

Prophet StandardProphet Standard 27 Apr 2000, Thu Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

We rather liked the piece and performances. But then Janie had/has a bit of a thing about The Prophet. But 25 years later, I don’t think I’d get a positive answer if I suggested a Monday night at the theatre, even if the subject matter was close to Janie’s heart!