PALESTINE PERFORMANCE

This performance was inflected with warmth and bubbled through with humour, despite the serious contents of the testimonies contained in this performance from Palestine. The play comprised three interleaved personal stories from George, Julia and Um Imad, elders from Palestine who had lived through the termination of the British Mandate of Palestine, the ensuing Arab-Israeli war, and the huge displacement of people that culminated in the partition and bifurcation of the country in the latter part of the twentieth century. A mix of ages, the performers, Iman Aoun, Yasmin Sameer and Jack Parker, worked as a close unit to give credence and emphasis to the stories being shared between the three, playing the separate testimonies as a reflective conversation between old friends. The audience really engaged with the detail of courtship, recollections of youth and the elders’ distaste for modern technology, which were in parallel with the testimonies performed from the UK elders. Iman’s use of video and projected image to bring context and reference points brought the human stories closer to the audience’s comprehension, seeing ordinary family life surviving through the catastrophic historical events.