Nehad Selaiha slips into dreamland at Al-Ghad theatre Once upon a time, there was a poor fisherman called Ali who sought refuge from harsh reality into the world of dreams. As soon as he finished his day's fishing, he would rush home to his humble shack and straw mat to surrender himself to his dreams. In that imaginary, colourful world, he would become, for a few hours, a rich and handsome prince. One night, he sees in his dream a radiantly beautiful girl, called Noor (Light), dancing naked under a tree and falls in love with her. When Noor reciprocates his love, he longs to drag her out of the world of dreams to live with her in reality and turns to the Khalif for help, invading the Khalif's private dream and braving his fearsome guards. To Ali's surprise, he finds the Khalif tied to a tree and being fiercely whipped by his wife. Naturally, the khalif is embarrassed by this unexpected intrusion and quickly refers Ali to the magician Qaroon, the only person who can release Noor into reality. But since Qaroon would surely demand money for his services, the Khalif tells Ali to visit him the following morning in his palace, in reality, to give him the needed money. To make sure that the Khalif is serious, Ali seeks out Qaroon in the dream, finds him, strikes the deal with him, and leaves Noor in his charge until he returns with the money the following night. In the morning, Ali wakes up and goes to the Khalif and reminds him of what he promised him the previous night in the dream, making a point of reminding him of how he saw him being humiliated by his wife. Ashamed and mortified, the Khalif explains to Ali that since his life is boringly pain free, he compensates for this by having sadistic dreams. He gives Ali the money, warning him never to divulge his secret. Of the one thousand dinars he takes from the Khalif, Ali keeps two to buy clothes for Noor since he would not want to take her out into reality naked. Qaroon, however, discovers this and threatens to cast a spell on Ali and turn him into a frog. Noor successfully intercedes for him and Qaroon's heart softens. He allows Noor to accompany Ali out of the dream into reality and the couple live happily ever after. Or, at least they do in the original Palestinian folk tale before Rasha Abdel Mon'im reworked it into a profound reflection in theatrical terms not only on the nature, value and danger of dreams and their relation to reality, but also on the nature of theatrical illusion, of performance, and the real function of theatre. Abdel Mon'im's thoughtful reworking of the story of Ali and Noor first appeared on stage in 2004, in Al-Misaharati troupe's Hakawi El-Haramlek (Tales of the Harem)), a remarkably fresh and original performance in the style of the old, popular comedy, made up of funny sketches and story telling, interspersed with biting satirical comments, confessional monologues and vintage folk and popular songs. In that performance, Abdel Mon'im, who took part in the writing as co-dramaturge, told the story herself in bits and pieces that threaded themselves through the whole performance, interweaving themselves with other material. Though Hakawi El-Haramlek was a roaring success and continued to play on and off for over 3 years after its opening, the story of Ali and Noor continued to haunt Abdel Mon'im, demanding to be aired once more in a more concentrated, more developed form that would focus the questions it raised in the new version. Abdel Mon'im's reading of the story of Ali and Noor finally came into its own in a new production called Sayd Al-Ahlam (Netting Dreams), directed by Mohamed Fawzi at Al-Ghad theatre. With sets and costumes by Mahmoud Hanafi, an original musical score by Hani Abdel Nasir, orchestrated by Rami Adel, puppets designed by Izzat Husni and manipulated by Shukry Abdallah, Rida Hassanein, Mohamed Labib, Nadim shawqi Higab, Basant Abbas and Mohamed shakir, and lighting by Mohamed Husni, Fawzi recreated Abdel Mon'im's fascinating version of this old, Palestinian folk tale into a lively and intriguing theatrical piece where popular, indigenous performance arts, like storytelling, shadow theatre, performing in silhouette and puppet shows provide both the very structure and texture of the work and are not simply overlaid on the text as decorative addenda, as often happens in many plays. In this performance, the storyteller (Nihad Abul Enein) stands at the door of the darkened hall, dressed like an Upper Egyptian gypsy, holding a fishing net in her hands, filled with small bits of folded paper, scribbled over with prophecies, and lets the audience pick one each, while intoning in a hypnotic voice, like a witch casting a spell, or a priestess chanting a hymn: If dreams were enough, we would never wake up; If dreams could satisfy our appetites, we would never wake up; If dreams could slake our thirst, we would never wake up. We take our seats in the dark and are faced with a small, semi-circular performance space, bordered on all sides with low curtains, topped with glass screens lighted from behind. With the words "Dreams are the food of the poor," the storyteller begins her narrative, accompanied by silhouettes, shadow puppets and human voices enacting the scenes she narrates on the different screens, which at once represent the world of dreams and that of artistic illusions. We begin with Ali's wish fulfillment dream, but soon enough, it merges with the rosy dream of Noor, an ordinary girl who becomes an incomparable beauty in her dream and meets a beautiful prince, the masochistic dream of the Khalif, in which his wife binds him to a tree and whips him hard, and even with the dream of the head of the state security bureau who dreams of censoring the wayward and rebellious dreams of the citizens. But the performance not only sinks the barriers between the dreams of individuals, but also the dividing lines between dream and reality. Curiously, in their dreams, the characters are well aware that they are dreaming; and though they long for the dream to come true, they fear the consequences were this to happen. In the dream, Noor asks Qaroon, the magician, if she would remain as beautiful outside the dream as inside it, and he says, of course not. And though for Ali, Noor's nakedness in the dream seems natural and acceptable, he perfectly realizes that once she steps out into reality, she has to be covered like ordinary women. The scene in which Ali visits the Khalif in reality, to get the money that Qaroon demands to release Noor out of the dream, is performed by cloth puppets, dressed exactly like the shadow puppets on the screens, and handled by Ahmed Beseem and Hisham Ali, the two actors who vocally play the Khalif and Ali, and who are also similarly dressed. The two actors emerge from behind the curtains underneath the screens, wheeling a mobile table and holding the puppets of Ali and the Khalif and perform the scene in full view of the audience. When they walk back behind the curtains, the storyteller picks up the thread of the narrative, with the help of the shadow puppets, and brings the story to a happy ending. At this point, however, actress Nashwa Ismail, who vocally played Noor, steps out from behind the curtains, fully clothed, into the small, circular performance space to contradict the happy ending provided by the storyteller. Soon, she is joined by Ali, and the two refuse to become weavers of comforting, escapist illusions like the storyteller. Rather than live happily ever after, the couple provide two different ends: Noor tells us that once outside the dream, she and Ali see each other for what they really are and are deeply dissatisfied with their life and end up separated. While she voluntarily joins the Khalif's Harem as one of his concubines to escape poverty, Ali is castrated by the Khalif's men to stop him blabbing about the Khalif's dream and ends up a eunuch in the same Harem. Neither of them can ever forgive the other, Noor tells us. Ali, on the other hand, tells a different story; he denies that he ever got out of dreamland. Rather than allow him to take Noor with him back into reality, Qaroon, the magician, took Noor for himself and walked out of dreamland, leaving Ali behind. Now, Ali only exists when Noor, now in the real world, looks into a magic crystal ball behind Qaroon's back. Rather than a poor fisherman with a girl in his dream, he says, he has become an insubstantial figure in a girl's dream. Was Ali so enamoured of his dream that he ended up its prisoner? In any case, the dream has consumed his real existence, reducing him to a 'baseless fabric', to the very stuff of dreams, like Prospero's actors/spirits in The Tempest. Indeed, few can watch Sayd Al-Ahlam without remembering Prospero's 'insubstantial pageant', its haunting atmosphere and reflections on the nature of art. Though the movement back and forth between dream and reality is quite intriguing and often hilarious, there is much more to the play than simply alerting us, albeit with pointed irony, to the harshness of reality and the hopeless futility of escaping into dreams. As Ali and Noor contradict the storyteller, they reveal themselves as actors in the story, as illusion-makers who object to the play they are asked to create before us and refuse to falsify reality. This rejection of shallow romantic illusions and facile happy endings brings in the question of the function of theatre for the individual and society. Suddenly, the play we have just seen and thoroughly enjoyed gains a new dimension and deeper meanings. That a simple folk tale could yield such profound perceptions and reflections testifies to Rasha Abdel Mon'im's genuine gifts as writer and Mohamed Fawzi's artistic imagination as director. Despite its seeming simplicity, Sayd Al-Ahlam is an exquisite folk play with serious, profound implications that give you plenty of food for thought.
