theatre
Review: ABC Radio 702 Sydney
Wednesday 19 August 2009 Filed in: Alex Buzo
| Emma Buzo
| Alana
Valentine | Norm and
Ahmed |
Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah
Listen
to a
PODCAST of
Diana Simmonds speaking with Richard Glover
about Norm & Ahmed plus
Shafana & Aunt Sarrinah at
the Seymour Centre until August 29 2009. Terrific
to hear how much a piece of theatre has affected
someone just by the tone of their voice. Click on
this link to listen to the
PODCAST of
the review on August 18th 2009.
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Review: beautifully wrought bookends
Tuesday 18 August 2009 Filed in: Alex Buzo
| Alana
Valentine | Norm and
Ahmed |
Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | Emma Buzo
| Laurence Coy
| Craig
Meneaud | sheridan
harbridge | camilla Ah
Kin
2009 Alex Buzo Memorial Lecture: Alana Valentine
Monday 10 August 2009 Filed in: Alana
Valentine | Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | Alex Buzo
| Norm and
Ahmed
Review: powerful...fascinating and moving...highly successful
Tuesday 11 August 2009 Filed in: Norm and
Ahmed |
Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | Alex Buzo
| Alana
Valentine
Review: Extraordinarily brave and bold double bill
Saturday 08 August 2009 Filed in: Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | Norm and
Ahmed |
Alana
Valentine | Alex Buzo
| Emma Buzo
| Aarne Neeme
| Laurence Coy
| Craig
Meneaud | sheridan
harbridge | camilla Ah
Kin
Article: Working on fresh approach to Buzo classic
Wednesday 05 August 2009 Filed in: Alana
Valentine | Emma Buzo
| Alex Buzo
| Makiz Ansari
| Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | Norm and
Ahmed
Opening Night: new worlds to be fathomed
Friday 07 August 2009 Filed in: by Emma Buzo
| Alana
Valentine | Alex Buzo
| Norm and
Ahmed |
Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah
While it's always a joy to see Laurence Coy (Norm) and Craig Meneaud (Ahmed) weave their magic as I've had the privilege to do on countless occasions, it was the premiere of the new work that was most exciting for me. Sheridan Harbridge (pictured above) and Camilla Ah Kin's illuminating performance was for an audience including many of the Muslim women interviewed by Alana Valentine for Shafana and Aunt Sarrinah. I know by now that when people come out of the theatre talking excitedly and starting sentences with "I never thought of it like that..." or "I had no idea..." that the vision is a success. As Shafana so profoundly utters:
"there are yet, new worlds to be fathomed and new
impossibilities to be
revealed."
SHAFANA AND AUNT SARRINAH by Alana Valentine
August 6th-29th 2009, Seymour Centre
Beautiful new images from the production here
Bookings here
Article: Holding a mirror to an Australian classic
Tuesday 04 August 2009 Filed in: Emma Buzo
| Alana
Valentine | Norm and
Ahmed |
Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | Alex Buzo
Article in The Sunday Telegraph
Sunday 26 July 2009 Filed in: Alana
Valentine | Emma Buzo
| Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | Norm and
Ahmed
Article: Triumph of censor's target
Monday 27 July 2009 Filed in: Alex Buzo
| Norm and
Ahmed |
Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | by Emma Buzo
| Emma Buzo
| Alana
Valentine
Read Triumph of censor's target in The Australian
Ahmed interviewed for Pakistani TV
Friday 17 July 2009 Filed in: by Emma Buzo
| Norm and
Ahmed |
Zahid
Minhas |
Laurence
Coy |
Craig
Meneaud
Uni of Syd student speaks about observing rehearsals
Wednesday 15 July 2009 Filed in: Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | Norm and
Ahmed |
Aarne
Neeme |
Alana
Valentine | Alex Buzo
![Chris-web-pic[1]](chris-web-pic005b1005d.jpg)
Variations on a theme: Aarne Neeme interviewed
Wednesday 15 July 2009 Filed in: Aarne Neeme
| Alana
Valentine | Norm and
Ahmed |
Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah
"What's exciting about the whole thing, is that it's not two plays that are directly the same. Alana hasn't tried to do a female version of Norm and Ahmed, but she's certainly picked up on the issues and the shape of the play...In Alana's play we don't have the two strangers meeting and clashing in a very sort of masculine way, we have two women who know each other very well, who share many of the same backgrounds and assumptions. They similarly have a clash, which is again resolved in their terms, not in the way men generally resolve things...It's the variations on a theme...they're the same but they're different and you have virtually celebrate both aspects of that process." Read more: PODCAST
Alana Valentine on her new play
Friday 10 July 2009 Filed in: by Alana
Valentine | Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah
Makiz Ansari visits rehearsals despite her bad hijab day
Tuesday 07 July 2009 Filed in: by Emma Buzo
| Alana
Valentine | Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | Makiz Ansari
Today
we were privileged to have Makiz Ansari from
Affinity Intercultural
Foundation and
her cousin Tamkin Ansari visit the rehearsals
of Shafana and Aunt
Sarrinah.
Afghani/Australian Makiz was a major source of
inspiration for playwright Alana Valentine and her
character of 'Shafana' takes much from Makiz's
eloquently told story. The entire creative team
were able to ask Makiz questions about her faith,
her cultural heritage and her experience of life
in Australia as a Muslim woman. Makiz joked she
was having a 'bad hijab day' but she was able to
give actor Sheridan Harbridge a valuable tutorial
in wearing the headscarf.
(Above: Sheridan Harbridge and Alana Valentine speak with Makiz and Tamkin Ansari, observed by University of Sydney students)
(Above: Sheridan Harbridge and Alana Valentine speak with Makiz and Tamkin Ansari, observed by University of Sydney students)
First day of rehearsals
I
visited the first rehearsal of Shafana and Aunt
Sarrinah yesterday
which is in excellent, spine-tingling shape. Alana
Valentine has steadily and masterfully filtered
feedback received over the last 6 months and
crafted the play into something markedly different
to the draft I first read in January.
Clockwise
from the checked shirt: Daniel Hunter (SM),
Aarne Neeme (Director), Deirdre Burges
(Designer), Sheridan Harbridge (Shafana),
Camilla Ah Kin (Aunt Sarrinah), Alana Valentine
(Playwright), Tony Youlden (Lighting) and
May-Brit Akerholt (Dramaturg). In the
background: one of the numerous University of
Sydney Department of Performance Studies'
students studying the rehearsal process.
That old "f" word: still a producer's nightmare
Saturday 04 July 2009 Filed in: Norm and
Ahmed |
by Emma
Buzo |
Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | Graeme
Blundell | censorship
| Alex Buzo
This
week, a Sydney high school whose English department
had booked out an entire performance of
Norm and Ahmed + Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah,
were forced by their principal to cancel the
booking. The reason? That pesky old "f" word
uttered by Norm. It appears the more things
change, the more they stay the same. 40 years ago,
that one word put the play at the centre of a
censorship battle which saw it banned in three
states, but also gave Australian theatre its front
page debut. Buzo was bemused and perhaps a little
annoyed. While the publicity achieved instant fame
for the play and its author, he felt its important
themes were somewhat overshadowed by the brouhaha
over one word.
The most distressing part about this school principal's fearful, archaic attitude is that it shows a complete lack of understanding about the purpose of dramatic art, which is to ask questions, encourage self reflection and open minds. Does banning students from seeing a production about the tension between cultures and generations in Australia help them become good citizens and critical thinkers? I think not.
Here's a very short bite from an ABC TV 'Talking Heads' episode on Graeme Blundell who produced Norm and Ahmed in 1970 with some great footage of the play being done for a magistrate and his court.
The most distressing part about this school principal's fearful, archaic attitude is that it shows a complete lack of understanding about the purpose of dramatic art, which is to ask questions, encourage self reflection and open minds. Does banning students from seeing a production about the tension between cultures and generations in Australia help them become good citizens and critical thinkers? I think not.
Here's a very short bite from an ABC TV 'Talking Heads' episode on Graeme Blundell who produced Norm and Ahmed in 1970 with some great footage of the play being done for a magistrate and his court.
Welcome to The Alex Buzo Company Blog
Friday 03 July 2009 Filed in: Norm and
Ahmed |
Shafana and
Aunt Sarrinah | Alana
Valentine | Alex Buzo
| by Emma Buzo
I first had the idea to commission a contemporary playwright to respond to Buzo's iconic Norm and Ahmed in 2007 and it's taken me two years of hard yakka to see it come to fruition. I wanted to bring new audiences to my father's work and plant it firmly in the present with a view to the future. I'm also aiming to create a bit of a "through line" for Australian theatrical heritage, now that we've got some history behind us. Cultural amnesia is a common affliction in Australia, I've discovered. Perhaps this is the antidote? We'll see.
Norm and Ahmed is an encounter between a white Aussie "bloke" and an articulate Pakistani uni student, inspired by an incident Alex witnessed in the uni bar at UNSW in 1968. It's about racism and generational tension, with the premise "never underestimate the power of difference." I decided to commission Alana Valentine to write the companion play as she told me a captivating story about the opposition a young Afghani Australian Muslim woman faced when she told her own family she wanted to wear the headscarf. We don't often hear of diversity within an ethnic community.
Since 2007, Norm and Ahmed has become a NSW HSC Drama text, and together with reports of racial bashings perpetrated against international students at Australian universities plus the ongoing dialogue about the wearing of the headscarf...that's one prophetic idea!
