Disgraced at Queensland Performing Arts Centre QPAC - Review

Disgraced at Queensland Performing Arts Centre QPAC - Review

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Posted 2016-10-18 by Damsel Martinfollow

Fri 14 Oct 2016 - Sun 06 Nov 2016

Disgraced at Queensland Performing Arts Centre (QPAC) - Review


Post 11 September 2001, playwright Ayad Akhtar was painfully aware of how life had changed. 'Folks who looked like me became very visible,' he told The Guardian. 'The fact of being a Muslim, whether religious or cultural, became a significant fact that could not be avoided.'

The creative work which emerged in the wake of the chaos, Disgraced , won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2013, and was the most produced American play of 2015. Although the action is set in a classy Manhattan apartment, Disgraced's exploration of the notions of freedom of speech, political correctness and persistent prejudices towards Islam, could not be more relevant to the Australian context.


Amir (Hazem Shammas), an ambitious corporate lawyer on his way up, lives with his artist wife Emily (Libby Munro). If there is one bone of contention between Amir and Emily, it is the former's renunciation of his Islamic faith, shed in the struggle to fit in at his Jewish law firm. Emily, on the other hand, draws on the Islamic tradition as she creates her canvasses, leaving her open to accusations of cultural appropriation.

Celebrating Emily's inclusion in a new art show, the pair host a dinner party to which art dealer Isaac (Mitchell Butel) and his wife Jory (Zindzi Okenyo) are invited. It is when talk inevitably turns to race, religion and politics that the carefully constructed edifice depicted in Disgraced begin to crumble. Appearances by Amir's nephew Abe (Kane Felsinger) also pile on the complications.


A Melbourne Theatre Company production presented by the Queensland Theatre Company, Disgraced features a razor-sharp script, a cracking cast, and 90 minutes of absorbing drama. Director Nadia Tass was drawn to the play's broad theme of changing one's identity in order to become accepted. 'Ask any migrant to this country - to get ahead, you have to fit in,' she says.

#brisbane_city
#theatre
#theatre -reviews
#october
!date 14/10/2016 -- 06/11/2016
%wnbrisbane
190413 - 2023-06-16 03:26:26

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