Review Theatre: Two Plays for Gaza | Hackney Empire | Brave acts | Stop The War Coalition | Reem Kelani | Palestinian | Corin Redgrave | Roger Lloyd Pack

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The Review - THEATRE by MICHAEL MANN
Published: 28 May 2009

Brave acts for victims of war

TWO PLAYS FOR GAZA
Hackney Empire

IT’S not often a stranger grabs your hand and starts crying.
But last Thursday at the Hackney Empire a silver-haired woman sitting next to me did just that.
The theatre was packed for Two Plays for Gaza, an evening organised by the Stop the War Coalition to raise money for a Palestinian music school destroyed during Israel’s bombardment of Gaza earlier this year.
As the theatre echoed to the voice of Palestinian singer Reem Kelani, singing about refugees and broken hearts, I felt the woman’s hand slip into mine as she sobbed.
The centre-piece of the evening was the reading of two controversial plays by stars, including Corin Redgrave and Roger Lloyd Pack. Caryl Churchill’s Seven Jewish Children depicts the transformation of mainstream Israeli Jews from tragic Holocaust victims to supporters of genocide against Palestinians.
The BBC decided it was too hot to handle and it was hounded off Broadway by Israel supporters. Here it received an ovation. The Trainer by David Wilson and Anne Aylor is a story of love and revenge based on composer Keith Burstein’s legal battle with the London Evening Standard. The Standard wrote that Burstein’s opera about a suicide bomber, Manifest Destiny, glorified terrorism. Burstein sued, but lost his case before a bench of judges.
The rights to his music and plays were seized by government receivers.
Burstein, played by Paul Herzberg, quips that the court ruling meant the government became his “publisher and agent”, and handed the copyright of the opera to his chief tormentor, the Standard. What a Dickensian twist!
Michael Mann

YOUR COMMENTS:

Michael Mann writes that 'Caryl Churchill's "Seven Jewish Children" depicts
the transformation of mainstream Israeli Jews from tragic Holocaust victims
to supporters of genocide against Palestinians'.
Mainstream Israeli Jews do not want to commit genocide. They do want to
live in peace within secure borders. Their brutal reprisals against attacks
from Hezbollah and Hamas can be condemned, but can also be understood.
Peddling sloppy analyses and inflammatory accusations of genocide is grossly
immoral, and has as much to do with free speech as shouting 'Fire!' in a
crowded theatre.
A Summers

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