Creation of a play about Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS)
As attacks by IS groups have become more frequent, creating a sense of fear, unease and helplessness I found myself pondering the situation and what could possibly be done about it.
I think as a way for myself to get out of those awful feelings, I thought “there need to be jokes.”
I have a history of writing comedy sketches and short plays and as I wondered what could be funny, I came up with an exchange among a group of jihadists where that day’s designated suicide bomber surprises his associates by saying “I think I will do mine tomorrow” with great conviction.
Finding the little dialogue in my head quite amusing, I tested it on my comedic friend Mark Scott, who I’ve collaborated with several times. He laughed–so I set about building on this to create a ten-minute play for the annual Short + Sweet Festival in Auckland.
In order to create these characters, I needed to research Islamic State and Islam, and understand the motivations of these terrorists. The internet, library and Al Jazeera television were all useful resources.
Prior to our rehearsals I also encouraged the actors in the play to create backgrounds for their individual characters so that they felt grounded and understood their characters’ objectives.
I managed to assemble a really special group of actors. I started with Mark, as I have full faith in his acting and comedic abilities. For the head guy in the group I immediately thought of Raj Singh.
I’ve seen him perform in previous Short + Sweet plays and last year he and Mark hit it off like “two naughty boys backstage”.
Fortunately, Raj said yes, even before I could show him an actual script. From the festival’s auditions, I found our other two actors, Sahil Arora and Imran Khan.
As Raj knew each of the others beforehand, he was like a great anchor for his fellow actors on and off-stage.
With that powerful voice and great presence, he was the head honcho character from the start.
At the auditions I saw that Sahil and Imran could portray anger and passion and also come across as natural.
This was Imran’s first performance in a play and Sahil is also relatively new to acting.
Their two characters provided a real hot-headed single-mindedness, which was a nice foil for the suicide bomber trying to avoid
his mission.
This character’s intention to find ways to delay or evade his suicidal duty became the crux of the play, and the foundation for the comedy. And while we managed to produce some funny lines and moments, we can’t escape the reality and gravity of the actual situation.
With my quickly-learned and limited knowledge of Islamic extremists I wanted to also get in some sense for the audience of why IS is fighting this fight, as I believe that understanding is paramount.
In our final rehearsals the actors were in full costume as their characters and we had all the props, including a couple of fake bombs.
An engineer friend of mine has a garage full of wires and other mysterious bits and pieces that we created these ‘bombs’ from. I could really see a much more formidable group of guys in front of me at this point.
It was going to be interesting to see if the audience was going find the play funny.
Our rehearsals always started with improv games to create a sense of fun and connection, as well focus.
One day we also enjoyed a bit of dancing to Bhangra music.
I would have liked more of that, but we had many things to work on. For example, in a later rehearsal the actors found they needed a stronger sense of connecting with each other onstage, so we did some exercises for that and focused rehearsals on this. At the end of the rehearsal period we had a band of enthusiastic brothers who had put in a lot of time and effort.
With such serious subject matter made into a comedic little piece, and no audience as yet, it was hard to know how people would react to this play.
It was a relief at our first public outing to hear laughter and know we had succeeded. We have received a lot of positive feedback and apparently didn’t offend anyone. The goal was always to entertain as many people as possible and produce laughter in the face of a subject that elicits fear.
At the end of the festival, awards were given out and we were gratified to receive more than our fair share: The People’s Choice, Best Independent Theatre Company, Best Script, Best Director and Best Actor. Quite an achievement and a great group effort that we are proud of.
We have been asked to perform One Day in ISIS again with three other plays from the festival in a brief run at the Tiny Theatre in Westmere in either October or November. Dates are to be announced.
As attacks by IS groups have become more frequent, creating a sense of fear, unease and helplessness I found myself pondering the situation and what could possibly be done about it.
I think as a way for myself to get out of those awful feelings, I thought “there need to be jokes.”
I have a history...
As attacks by IS groups have become more frequent, creating a sense of fear, unease and helplessness I found myself pondering the situation and what could possibly be done about it.
I think as a way for myself to get out of those awful feelings, I thought “there need to be jokes.”
I have a history of writing comedy sketches and short plays and as I wondered what could be funny, I came up with an exchange among a group of jihadists where that day’s designated suicide bomber surprises his associates by saying “I think I will do mine tomorrow” with great conviction.
Finding the little dialogue in my head quite amusing, I tested it on my comedic friend Mark Scott, who I’ve collaborated with several times. He laughed–so I set about building on this to create a ten-minute play for the annual Short + Sweet Festival in Auckland.
In order to create these characters, I needed to research Islamic State and Islam, and understand the motivations of these terrorists. The internet, library and Al Jazeera television were all useful resources.
Prior to our rehearsals I also encouraged the actors in the play to create backgrounds for their individual characters so that they felt grounded and understood their characters’ objectives.
I managed to assemble a really special group of actors. I started with Mark, as I have full faith in his acting and comedic abilities. For the head guy in the group I immediately thought of Raj Singh.
I’ve seen him perform in previous Short + Sweet plays and last year he and Mark hit it off like “two naughty boys backstage”.
Fortunately, Raj said yes, even before I could show him an actual script. From the festival’s auditions, I found our other two actors, Sahil Arora and Imran Khan.
As Raj knew each of the others beforehand, he was like a great anchor for his fellow actors on and off-stage.
With that powerful voice and great presence, he was the head honcho character from the start.
At the auditions I saw that Sahil and Imran could portray anger and passion and also come across as natural.
This was Imran’s first performance in a play and Sahil is also relatively new to acting.
Their two characters provided a real hot-headed single-mindedness, which was a nice foil for the suicide bomber trying to avoid
his mission.
This character’s intention to find ways to delay or evade his suicidal duty became the crux of the play, and the foundation for the comedy. And while we managed to produce some funny lines and moments, we can’t escape the reality and gravity of the actual situation.
With my quickly-learned and limited knowledge of Islamic extremists I wanted to also get in some sense for the audience of why IS is fighting this fight, as I believe that understanding is paramount.
In our final rehearsals the actors were in full costume as their characters and we had all the props, including a couple of fake bombs.
An engineer friend of mine has a garage full of wires and other mysterious bits and pieces that we created these ‘bombs’ from. I could really see a much more formidable group of guys in front of me at this point.
It was going to be interesting to see if the audience was going find the play funny.
Our rehearsals always started with improv games to create a sense of fun and connection, as well focus.
One day we also enjoyed a bit of dancing to Bhangra music.
I would have liked more of that, but we had many things to work on. For example, in a later rehearsal the actors found they needed a stronger sense of connecting with each other onstage, so we did some exercises for that and focused rehearsals on this. At the end of the rehearsal period we had a band of enthusiastic brothers who had put in a lot of time and effort.
With such serious subject matter made into a comedic little piece, and no audience as yet, it was hard to know how people would react to this play.
It was a relief at our first public outing to hear laughter and know we had succeeded. We have received a lot of positive feedback and apparently didn’t offend anyone. The goal was always to entertain as many people as possible and produce laughter in the face of a subject that elicits fear.
At the end of the festival, awards were given out and we were gratified to receive more than our fair share: The People’s Choice, Best Independent Theatre Company, Best Script, Best Director and Best Actor. Quite an achievement and a great group effort that we are proud of.
We have been asked to perform One Day in ISIS again with three other plays from the festival in a brief run at the Tiny Theatre in Westmere in either October or November. Dates are to be announced.
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