Artists
Ofira Henig
Director
Khalifa Natour
Dramaturgy, Translation & Actor
Kinan Azmeh
Music
Ashraf Hanna
Visual Concept
Ramy Al Asheq
Poetry
Annie Atedgi
Costume Design
Saleh Bakri
Actor
Carlos Gharzuzi
Actor
Maya Omaia Keesh
Actress
Anan Abu Jabir
Actor
Rawan Mansour
Assistenz
Morad Abu El Hija
Technik
Miriam Damm
Light Design
Muaz Aljubeh
Lichtbildtechniker
Director Ofira Henig—most recently seen in Berlin with her productions The Bees’ Road and KIND OF at the Schaubühne’s Internationale Neue Dramatik Festival—and actor-dramaturg Khalifa Natour have developed a new piece for the Pierre Boulez Saal that blurs the boundaries between theater, music, and poetry and between different cultures. The Queen Commanded Him to Forget is based on a novel by Lebanese writer Elias Khoury and also draws inspiration from Brecht’s Mother Courage, Mahler’s Kindertotenlieder, and the tale of Hansel and Gretel. At the center of the story is the character of Umm Hasan, who will do anything to protect her children in times of war. The piece explores the role of literature as a preserver of memory and as part of a process that eternalizes forgetting.
In Arabic with German and English surtitles
Supported by the Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung