05/08/24

Pleasance Courtyard (Upstairs), Edinburgh

“The villainy you teach me, I will execute, and it shall go hard…”

This Israeli-Palestinian-British co-creation, written by Nadav Burstein and co-produced by Floating Shed and Flabbergast, provides a timely discourse on the devastating nature of war, where ordinary people of all stripes are sacrificed to serve the interests of a powerful few.

The play opens with Wonder Woman and Albert Einstein drinking vodka with two friends, as the teenage protagonists prepare for a fancy dress party. This serves to underscore the quartet’s youth, engaging our sympathy as we realise that three of them have been conscripted into the Israeli Defence Forces. The fourth (Harvey Schorah) has an exemption, courtesy of Crohn’s disease.

Burstein’s efficient deployment of the small cast is impressive: through their stories, we see multiple perspectives on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There’s the combat pilot (Tom Dalrymple), who’s scared to kill, but believes Israel has no choice but to fight its enemies: “If you wrong us, shall we not revenge?” Then there’s Osher (Tarik Badwan), half-Palestinian and in active service. His name means happiness but he feels torn apart, traumatised by what he’s forced to do. Burstein’s character, meanwhile, is trying every trick in the book to avoid serving in a war he thinks is wrong, even turning to self-harm. It’s all very well for Schorah’s character to go on protest marches and tell his friends that they should rebel: everything he says is right, but they’re in the thick of it, and they’re terrified.

I’m impressed by the openness with which this young company approach this thorniest of topics, gently urging us to interrogate everything we think we know. Shylock’s most famous speech is paraphrased and repeated, refrain-like: “Hath not a Jew…? Hath not an Arab…? If you prick us, do we not bleed?”

Schorah’s character works well as a mirror for the audience. He’s on the outside, like us, making judgements from the comfort of our living rooms. Don’t be misled: the play makes no excuse for genocide. But it does remind us that, when we’re placing blame, we need to focus on the powerful, not the powerless.

Theatrically – as one might expect from Flabbergast – the piece has a fragmented structure, spotlighting first one character and then another. Loosely stitched with a sprinkling of history and Shakespeare, it all adds up to something very thoughtful, and the cast are keen to hear what audience members think. If only the world’s political leaders were as committed to constructive dialogue.

4.5 stars

Susan Singfield