Appraisal
Latefa Ahrare's <i>The Pianist </i>
The Pianist, a monodrama performed and directed by the Moroccan actress Latefa Ahrare through Fujairah Culture and Media Authority, the UAE, was brought to us as the final theatrical performance in a series of world standard national and international plays shown at the National Theatre, Shilpakala Academy, Dhaka, recently.
Latefa Ahrare performed the monodrama all by herself: playing the role of the pianist, helped out by a red suitcase, a gents' coat, a coat-hanger, a pair of white shoes and a pendant wooden frame. The monologue was in Arabic, yet the audience understood her so well that they clapped mid-play two or three times, and at the end, gave her a standing ovation. How did this amazing woman-cum-director manage to convey her message so starkly without the help of words? The answer is, through her body. The versatility, the nuances, the sounds, the gestures, the dances, the claps, the exclamations and the moans, all through which she conveyed her passion for freedom, her passion for music, for love, for the good things of life.
With nothing but a handful of props, the actor's own voice and background music, The Pianist may have been performed in Shakespeare's time at the Globe Theatre centuries ago, except for one fact: the theme of the play is truly modern: a talented woman with passion for music and how this passion is problematized and negotiated in a patriarchal setting.
The text of this monodrama performance, written by Saudi playwright Malha Abdullah, is based on the story of a woman who is doing her post doctoral thesis in music, how she meets opposition by her husband, symbolized by the gents' jacket hanging on the coat-hanger, and how her uncurbed passion for music leads her on to explore herself in her fullness of being as a piano artiste, teacher, dancer, singer, and lover of nature, and above all a woman with a sensuous and delightful body who takes pleasure and delight in her female body and her wholeness of being. As Ahrare says, responding to a question from the audience, in Question and Answer Time that took place after the performance, the husband wants to see his wife in a limited number of roles: as a body whose function is only cooking, cleaning, child-rearing and sex. But the pianist challenges these stereotyped roles by going beyond. She challenges these roles not only by her utter devotion and commitment to music, but also by showing the sheer individuality, the distinctive personality, of the human being. The distinctiveness of the artist who is razed to the ground by her husband's beating one moment, then moved to hope and joy by seeing the simple sight of the sun shining outside the window ("As-Shams!", she exclaims in pure joy), and who can be roused to ecstasy at the sight of falling rain, which washes her agony, and cleanses her thoroughly, so that after this cleansing she is once more the ecstatic, joyful woman roused to make love (with the husband, or whoever is symbolized by the coat this time).
The pure sensuousness of desire in the woman is very much alive. Towards the end the performer plays with the white shoes to make the point that while the man wants the woman at his shoes, so to speak, the self-emancipated pianist manages to subvert this role and play and dance with the shoes in her hands. Throughout the play this exploration of roles, identity, doer-ship and being is done by dint of magnificent bodily performance that tells the story and delineates the whole gamut of emotion and feeling: writhing agony, inner conflict, love and desire for a man, tenderness for a baby, and passion for the cause of freedom: the freedom of woman.
"Anti-hurra!" she shouts, addressing women in particular, and in Bangla "Tomra Shadheen"! (You are free!), to which the audience responds with a hall-full of applause. "Anti" is "you", a pronoun used for the female gender. She gets applause from a hall-full of men, as well as women, of this country. And she sings of freedom not only to those walking the earth but to children unborn, within the womb, that they may be born with freedom in them. Thus she becomes the preacher and the prophet.
Sheer originality of improvisation is a lead characteristic of the play. Thus the actress puts an arm through one arm of the jacket to simulate her partner fumbling for her body when the couple meet! This is woman with doer-ship in the act of love: her desire provoked by the sensuality of the rain falling on her body, she shouts "Al-Hubbo." "Al-Aashiqo", the slogan is repeated again and again, until the meaning sinks in with the Bangladeshi audience and its very limited repertoire of Arab or Farsi words, that Ahrare is talking of love.
Feats of improvisation with scarcity of props heighten the 'theatrical' effect: the coat hanger becomes a podium from which the pianist lectures her students, the red suitcase is sometimes a seat (in the house, by the river, and in the bathroom), sometimes a bed for lovemaking and sometimes a piano. The black mantle is at first naturally worn thrown over the shoulders, it is then used as a scarf which Ahrare holds taut at the neck to simulate the hijab, holding it as a gesture of protest against its oppressiveness, later the mantle is thrown off for effect to show the actress undressing, then used as a body-scrub, and later, even trussed inside the belly to simulate pregnancy. All this is done before the audience, in a natural free flowing series of actions. There is no need for the black curtain to fall to reset the stage.
The pianist, who is also subject to her husband's will, faces the wrath of patriarchy for striving at individuality. She is beaten by her husband or partner, there is shouting, and argument followed by physical violence used by the husband, ending in that peculiar high note of whine that those women know who have been beaten or have witnessed their mothers being beaten. The richness of the depiction lies in how even the violence flows in rhythm with the movement of the drama and is synergized within it. And it is amazing to see the same character producing all these effects: the coat, symbolizing the husband, is conveniently used for showing the husband in a fight with his wife, for showing lovemaking, and for dancing. The final use of the coat comes when Ahrare wears it back to front as it faces her, before giving her impassioned lecture as a teacher during which she raises the slogan for women's freedom. This use of the coat, with the wrong side facing, appears to signify the adoption and use of male-oriented power positions in a man's world (the strident professional, the powerful speaker), while at the same time hinting that it is only an adoption, not an original use, (wrong side facing): the remarkable use of this symbolism is subtle, yet strikingly primal at the same time, churning over male-oriented symbols upside down in an effort to fit the woman who wants to be known as an individual.
Ahrare uses her body convincingly to carry messages and meaning: one unforgettable sequence is the way she cleanses herself on the groins while bathing in the rain, before meeting her man for an amorous encounter, but she's done with the gesture in a jiffy: in about one-fourth the time it takes to read about it.
Latefa Ahrare, in actual life a teacher, and a government officer working with the Ministry of Culture in Morocco, is in reality a dynamic, original, courageous and multi-talented activist artiste. She has also a youthful, sensuous and feminine body of remarkable grace and sinewy agility that she has trained for acrobatic feats, dance and song, so that it is indeed a remarkable instrument to carry her message.
Apart from the innate message of this dazzling theatrical performance, the Bangladeshi audience was regaled to a glimpse of Arab culture: gestures, language, dance and music, through the performance of this remarkable actress and director in an unforgettable theatrical monodrama.
At the close of the performance, the audience was invited to ask the performer questions and to make comments, which not only brought audience and performer closer, but also threw light on the nature and meaning of the work just performed.
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