Middle East life is a cabaret at Fringe festival

It began with the offer of sweet black tea in a styrofoam cup from a Lebanese writer wearing a kilt. It ended with a Tom and Jerry cartoon illustrating a Syrian ballad. In between there was an Egyptian poem about womanhood, a short play by a leading Scottish playwright about conflict, and an elderly woman weaving at a loom, her scuttling hands projected onto a large screen.

Here is the News from Over There (Over There is the News from Here) is a mash-up of poems – some in Arabic, some in English – and short stories, plays, songs, music and commentary, all from or about the Middle East.

Even by the standards of the edgy Edinburgh Fringe, Here is the News …pushes the limits of what counts as performance. Billed as a cabaret, it’s staged late at night in a former lecture theatre of the University of Edinburgh’s old veterinary school.

“There is a speed and informality to the cabaret form that allows for a more conversational tone,” says the show’s director Lorne Campbell, who is also the artistic director of the prestigious English theatre company Northern Stage, which backs the project.

“I wanted the audience to experience it comfortably and at ease, not to approach the Middle East with a serious and pious head on, as so often happens. I wanted it to be as if having a coffee with someone, exchanging thoughts and stories.”

Hence, the sweet tea offered by the kilted emcee, who is leading Lebanese satirist and playwright Abdel Rahim Alawiji, as we make our way to our seats.

The serious aim behind this late-night show is to present a different Middle East to Edinburgh audiences.

Original article by Dea Birkett

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Middle East life is a cabaret at Fringe festival