Nehad Selaiha takes theatrical stock of 2008 and hopes for a more Though Harold Pinter cannot be said to have had the same profound influence on Egyptian and Arab drama as say Brecht, Beckett or Pirandello, his death as 2008 was drawing to a close has deeply saddened the theatre community and many theatre lovers and intellectuals in Egypt and other Arab countries. The fact that most of his plays have been done into Arabic and frequently staged or broadcast on Radio since the late 1950s (see my "Pinter in Egypt" in the Weekly on 27 October, 2005) has made him a familiar and much admired figure in this part of the world and only last October two of his most famous works, Old Times and Betrayal, were aired in new productions by the Youth and Al-Tali'a theatres respectively during the Cairo International Festival for Experimental Theatre. But it is not only for his haunting, elusive plays and intriguingly elliptical mode of writing that Pinter will be long and lovingly remembered here, or why his death has caused such genuine grief; far more significant than the plays was his tough, uncompromising political and moral integrity which manifested itself in his relentless criticism of Israel's inhuman practices in Palestine, his unwavering support of the oppressed all over the world, his vehement opposition to the war on Iraq and virulent denunciation of what he described in his stunning Nobel Prize acceptance speech as the new American Imperialism, or policy of 'full spectrum dominance'. In losing him, many feel they have lost a brave and valuable ally in the struggle for freedom and a rational, peaceful and just world. Pinter's death was a sad end to a predominantly sad and depressing year. With so much brutal and often gratuitous violence erupting all over the world, children aged 9 and 11 forced to carry arms and drawn into the bloody conflict in Darfour, senseless ethnic and sectarian feuds spreading everywhere and tearing nations apart, the situation in Gaza next door getting worse by the minute, with no glimmer of a solution and constantly preying on one's mind, the peace process seeming to have gone into a dark tunnel with no light at the end, and, to top it all, the cataclysmic global financial crisis which has spared no one, rich or poor, one tried to escape into the magical world of theatre and draw hope and courage from the defiant young artists there, even though most of the images they have been lately projecting are quite cheerless. But even there, one found no solace. Despite some brave efforts here and there and a few bright spots, the overall picture seemed bleak and dismal and achieved its most eloquent symbolic expression in the National theatre fire. The fire mysteriously broke out 3 days before the end of Ramadan, on Saturday, 27 September, just a few minutes before sunset, when Muslims were preparing to break their fast, that is, at the deadest time of the day, when Cairo becomes like a ghost city. Though a fire station exists a few hundred yards away, facing the theatre across Ataba square, and there was hardly any traffic at all at that time of day, it took over 3 hours to put the fire out. In those 3 hours, the fire had all but totally consumed the inside of that old, beautiful theatre, destroying the whole stage, the curtain, the tiring rooms, the scenery and costumes storerooms, most of the auditorium and part of the quaint oriental dome that tops the building. It was an awesome sight which sent many of the artists who rushed to the scene into hysterical weeping and left everyone who watched it, even those who had never set foot inside the building, in a state of deep shock and sorrow. It was like watching your most cherished memories, the best part of your life, of your history -- the last relic of that once elegant and beautiful part of Cairo -- wantonly and viciously destroyed. As I watched the horrible flames, I remembered the old Opera house which burnt down in 1969 (to be replaced by an ugly, multistory car park -- a veritable eyesore and architectural monstrosity), the graceful arcades facing the National with their old, historically famous cafes, like Café Matatia (which were ruthlessly pulled down in subsequent years to make room for an unsightly flyover), and the enchanting Azbakiyya garden of my early childhood (once a lovely park, now a virtual rubbish dump)); but, above all, I remembered the horrible Beni Sweif fire which claimed the lives of dozens of theatre people on 5 September, 2005, and the memory was devastating. Mercifully, the National was deserted when the fire broke out and the building itself, though extensively damaged, has miraculously survived; and for this one has to be infinitely thankful in spite of everything. Looking back on 2008, I realize that a lot happened in theatre before that fire, and a lot has happened since; and yet, the fiendish glow of those flames seem to colour all my recollections, as if they had burnt themselves into my memory. Everything I saw before that fire seems in retrospect to have had a deeper meaning, a hidden message, an ominous forewarning of imminent disaster. When I covered the 1st Al-Hanager season for independent theatre which ran from 18 February to 18 April at Rawabet I think I vaguely sensed this. Celebrating that brilliant event in an article on this page, entitled "Nothing can defeat her" and published on 28 February, I found myself bitterly dwelling on the arbitrary closing down of Al-Hanager theatre, together with many other sorely needed venues, and the brave efforts of its artistic-director, Huda Wasfi, to protect the many wonderful independent groups the centre had nurtured and provide them with an alternative space. Describing what had become of that once scintillating centre I said: "It now looks as if a bomb has ripped through it -- a mess of dangling wires, flapping tatters, broken furniture and strewn rubble, and the sight of the stacks of beams lying in pools of dirty water outside it, waiting patiently to be used and slowly rotting in the sun is enough to make you want to cry. When you ask why renovation has not started, you are told that the whole operation was stopped after the corruption scandal at the Cultural Development Fund and cannot begin until this ugly business has been sorted out." Did I have a premonition then that soon enough, whether due to corruption or criminal negligence, another theatre would meet with a fate worse than Al-Hanager's -- and not just any theatre, but the great National itself? And did I have the same foreboding when I raved in another article on this page on 12 June about Khalid Galal's Qahwa Saada (Black Coffee), saying that though it "comes across as a rollicking roller coaster ... it carries a prophecy of doom and gloom"? Was there some sinister hint in the fact that this prophecy was couched in some lines picked out from 'The Fire Sermon' in Eliot's The Waste Land in which Tiresias, "though blind,/ throbbing between two lives," declares that he "Perceived the scene and foretold the rest"? And is it not ironically significant that this brilliant show that has been unanimously voted the best production in 2008 and won prizes at both the national and experimental festivals that year should have chosen for its central metaphor a funerary gathering and for its focal theme the death or willful destruction of everything we cherish? Al-Hanager's season at Rawabet, the Creativity Centre's Qahwa Saada, the Youth theatre's Les Miserables and Puzzle One, Ein Shams University's parody of Romeo and Juliet, Cafeteria by the Alexandrian independent troupe Wogooh (Faces) and Al-Ghad theatre's Al-Saher (The Magician) Yusef Idris make up the best theatrical crop of 2008 and, significantly, were all produced before the fire at the National. After the fire, there was nothing -- as if theatre had suddenly fizzled out. The experimental festival which followed soon after the fire was artistically a very modest affair indeed, and but for Qahwa Saada, which won Khalid Galal the best director award in the international contest, and Cafeteria, which generated a lot of intense excitement and many ugly and nerve-racking wrangles with the establishment, including the police, when Huda Wasfi insisted that it performs at Al-Hanger though it is officially closed, CIFET 2008 would have left us with nothing to remember. Even the much publicized roundtable it held purportedly to discuss with the independent troupes their problems and demands -- an unprecedented concession on the part of the establishment which at the time raised many hopes -- was soon revealed as a mere charade staged for propaganda and has yielded nothing. As for next year, who knows? There are rumors that Farouk Husni will be leaving the ministry of culture soon for the UNESCO or some other post and this makes an air of uncertainty hang over the future of all the official festivals and events his ministry has sponsored so far. Will the new minister abolish them? And what will become of the state theatre and cultural palaces organizations and of all their many closed theatres? Will the National be functional again in 2009? Will Al-Hanager building be finally renovated as promised, or at least restored to what it was? Will Al-Tali'a theatre and its next-door neighbour Al-Arayes finally reopen after all the endless delays? There is talk of a new Arab Theatre Festival sponsored jointly by Farouk Husni and Sheikh Sultan Al-Qasimi, the ruler of Sharja, to be held from 10 to 15 January, 2009. I hear it will open at the Opera house with a play called Samson and Delilah penned and funded by Al-Qasimi himself and staged by veteran director Ahmed Abdel-Halim. If it is anything like his former sumptuously produced plays, then it is "no, thank you very much" for me. I also hear this festival, a byproduct of the recently formed Arab Theatre Association, also funded by Al-Qasimi and his own brainchild, will host 10 visiting shows from different Arab countries, plus 2 from Egypt. The question is, where will they all perform? So far, this is hearsay; nothing has been officially announced, and so, I will believe it when I see it. One is on surer grounds when one looks away from the ministry of culture and its quixotic ventures. On 17 January, the French Cultural Centre will hold as usual its valuable annual Festival des Jeunes Createurs, and The Bibliotheca Alexandrina's prestigious Creative Forum for Independent Theatre Groups: Europe-Mediterranean will take place from 1 to 10 February, as it has annually done in the past 4 years. These are two events that are sure to happen unless a war breaks out or there is some national or natural disaster, and they are ones I have been following for years and highly recommend. At least, they are serious and genuinely stand up for youth, creativity and independence.
