How does theater help to tell stories that otherwise wouldn't be heard?
How Children Experience War and Its Consequences
By LYNETTE CLEMETSON
What comes to mind when someone says the word war?
For Adbul Hakeem Paigir, 14, from Afghanistan, the response was simple and solemn. ''Wives without husbands, children without parents,'' he said, bathed in a warm white spotlight. ''People forced out of their homes.''
For Fatu Sankoh, 15, the word conjured up images of running through streets filled with rotting corpses, a horror she endured fleeing from her home in civil-war-torn Sierra Leone. ''I think whoever is fighting should put us on a plane and let us go,'' the doe-eyed Ms. Sankoh said from her seat onstage. ''And when they finish fighting, bring us back.''
The bracing perspectives are featured in ''Children of War,'' a production that opens tonight at the Theater of the First Amendment at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va. The oral-history project, which tells the harrowing stories of six young refugees now living in the Washington area, is one of several productions under way nationwide taking a contemplative look at the human realities behind the stark headlines of military conflict.
The cast members in ''Children of War'' are not actors, and their stories, though scripted by the director, are not made up. In addition to Abdul and Fatu, the cast includes Dereen Pasha, 15, a Kurd from Iraq who saw his father murdered by Iraqi soldiers; Awa Nur, 15, from Somalia, whose baby sister was shot and killed by guerrillas during her family's exodus from Mogadishu; and Yarvin Cuchilla, 18, who suffered years of domestic abuse in a family torn apart by civil war in El Salvador.
There is just one adult in the ensemble, Farinaz Amirsehi, who spent seven and a half years in prison in her native Iran in the 1980's. Ms. Amirsehi, 42, now works as a therapist, treating victims of torture and abuse. During the 75-minute performance, the six principals use call-and-response storytelling to recount their individual experiences of loss, torment and adjustment to a new life in the United States.
The production, which is directed by the New York-based playwright Ping Chong, was commissioned by the Center for Multicultural Human Services, a mental-health organization in Falls Church, Va., that offers counseling services to immigrants and refugees.
While the themes of the production are particularly poignant as the United States teeters on the brink of war with Iraq, its creators say it is not intended as a statement for or against a military strike. ''It is meant more to remind people of the costs of war,'' Mr. Chong said.
Dennis Hunt, executive director of the counseling agency that commissioned the play, said it was a cost often disproportionately felt by children. ''It reminds us that there isn't always a direct cause-and-effect link between what is done wrong and who gets punished,'' said Mr. Hunt, who, along with Mr. Chong and a group of therapists, interviewed more than 80 refugee children to select five emotionally strong enough to tell their stories onstage.
The project is one of several productions that are, directly or indirectly, examining issues of war. Peter Sellars's update of ''The Children of Herakles,'' a tragedy by Euripides about the plight of refugees and war victims that is scheduled to open next month at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Mass., incorporates real refugee children into the cast.
Caryl Churchill's ''Far Away,'' playing in New York, is an apocalyptic fable of a world where war is eternal and all the planet's creatures have taken sides. Tony Kushner is working on a short play dealing with the Bush administration's handling of the crisis in Iraq.
Nationwide, artists are participating in teach-ins and convening workshops like ''Making Theater During Wartime,'' which will be held at Fordham University in the spring, to encourage a sense of cultural activism in the artistic community.
''When people are being backed into right and wrong, yes and no, pro and con, theater works to open up people's hearts,'' said the playwright Eve Ensler, whose recent work, ''Necessary Targets,'' explores the effects of war on women in a Bosnian refugee camp and who is currently supporting theater projects in the Middle East. ''Theater opens people up to duality, and complexity, and ambiguity so that other parts of the mind start to operate.''
At a preview on Wednesday of ''Children of War,'' audience members, squirmed in their seats as they grappled with the complexity and ambiguity of the six lives laid bare on the small stage before them.
In the case of Dereen, whose family fled Iraq, audience members heard the story of how his Kurdish parents first met on a street in Sulaymani, in northern Iraq. They were noticeably moved as he told of running to his gunned-down father, who died on the floor in front of him. They laughed as he related changes in his life since moving to the United States six years ago.
''In our town house every day from 5 to 7 p.m. I watch the Kurdish channel from Iraq with my mother, to stay in touch with my homeland,'' Dereen said. ''Then I go upstairs to my room and watch 'The Simpsons.' ''
Shayan Pasha, Dereen's mother, like all of the parents of the young cast members, had initial concerns about the project. ''I worried a lot about the hidden feelings inside of him,'' Mrs. Pasha said, in the audience for the preview performance. ''But after doing this his dark personality is more open. I can see his smile again, and for the first time he is talking about the future.''
It is a future, Dereen said before a recent rehearsal, that feels precarious because of new prospects of war. ''Saddam Hussein has caused my family much pain,'' said the teenager, whose boyish face and dark eyes carry the weighty seriousness of a much older man. ''But I still have hundreds of family members in Iraq. If we go to war, the United States will be killing my family, too. That's why I wanted to do this, so people would think about that.''
People, for instance, like Jan and Ron Stanley, who sat wiping away tears after the performance. ''This makes me think more about what I'm doing to make sure this stops happening,'' said Mr. Stanley, 44, an English teacher who taught the cast member Ms. Cuchilla last year, but who was hearing her full life story for the first time.
''Children of War,'' which runs through Dec. 15, cannot tour in the traditional sense. The cast members, after all, have school. But its creators hope it will be replicated in other cities with other refugee children. They are considering creating a video version of the production for educational and therapeutic use.
''With everything that's going on in the world right now,'' Mr. Chong said, ''I suspect this project will have a future.''
By LYNETTE CLEMETSON
What comes to mind when someone says the word war?
For Adbul Hakeem Paigir, 14, from Afghanistan, the response was simple and solemn. ''Wives without husbands, children without parents,'' he said, bathed in a warm white spotlight. ''People forced out of their homes.''
For Fatu Sankoh, 15, the word conjured up images of running through streets filled with rotting corpses, a horror she endured fleeing from her home in civil-war-torn Sierra Leone. ''I think whoever is fighting should put us on a plane and let us go,'' the doe-eyed Ms. Sankoh said from her seat onstage. ''And when they finish fighting, bring us back.''
The bracing perspectives are featured in ''Children of War,'' a production that opens tonight at the Theater of the First Amendment at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va. The oral-history project, which tells the harrowing stories of six young refugees now living in the Washington area, is one of several productions under way nationwide taking a contemplative look at the human realities behind the stark headlines of military conflict.
The cast members in ''Children of War'' are not actors, and their stories, though scripted by the director, are not made up. In addition to Abdul and Fatu, the cast includes Dereen Pasha, 15, a Kurd from Iraq who saw his father murdered by Iraqi soldiers; Awa Nur, 15, from Somalia, whose baby sister was shot and killed by guerrillas during her family's exodus from Mogadishu; and Yarvin Cuchilla, 18, who suffered years of domestic abuse in a family torn apart by civil war in El Salvador.
There is just one adult in the ensemble, Farinaz Amirsehi, who spent seven and a half years in prison in her native Iran in the 1980's. Ms. Amirsehi, 42, now works as a therapist, treating victims of torture and abuse. During the 75-minute performance, the six principals use call-and-response storytelling to recount their individual experiences of loss, torment and adjustment to a new life in the United States.
The production, which is directed by the New York-based playwright Ping Chong, was commissioned by the Center for Multicultural Human Services, a mental-health organization in Falls Church, Va., that offers counseling services to immigrants and refugees.
While the themes of the production are particularly poignant as the United States teeters on the brink of war with Iraq, its creators say it is not intended as a statement for or against a military strike. ''It is meant more to remind people of the costs of war,'' Mr. Chong said.
Dennis Hunt, executive director of the counseling agency that commissioned the play, said it was a cost often disproportionately felt by children. ''It reminds us that there isn't always a direct cause-and-effect link between what is done wrong and who gets punished,'' said Mr. Hunt, who, along with Mr. Chong and a group of therapists, interviewed more than 80 refugee children to select five emotionally strong enough to tell their stories onstage.
The project is one of several productions that are, directly or indirectly, examining issues of war. Peter Sellars's update of ''The Children of Herakles,'' a tragedy by Euripides about the plight of refugees and war victims that is scheduled to open next month at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Mass., incorporates real refugee children into the cast.
Caryl Churchill's ''Far Away,'' playing in New York, is an apocalyptic fable of a world where war is eternal and all the planet's creatures have taken sides. Tony Kushner is working on a short play dealing with the Bush administration's handling of the crisis in Iraq.
Nationwide, artists are participating in teach-ins and convening workshops like ''Making Theater During Wartime,'' which will be held at Fordham University in the spring, to encourage a sense of cultural activism in the artistic community.
''When people are being backed into right and wrong, yes and no, pro and con, theater works to open up people's hearts,'' said the playwright Eve Ensler, whose recent work, ''Necessary Targets,'' explores the effects of war on women in a Bosnian refugee camp and who is currently supporting theater projects in the Middle East. ''Theater opens people up to duality, and complexity, and ambiguity so that other parts of the mind start to operate.''
At a preview on Wednesday of ''Children of War,'' audience members, squirmed in their seats as they grappled with the complexity and ambiguity of the six lives laid bare on the small stage before them.
In the case of Dereen, whose family fled Iraq, audience members heard the story of how his Kurdish parents first met on a street in Sulaymani, in northern Iraq. They were noticeably moved as he told of running to his gunned-down father, who died on the floor in front of him. They laughed as he related changes in his life since moving to the United States six years ago.
''In our town house every day from 5 to 7 p.m. I watch the Kurdish channel from Iraq with my mother, to stay in touch with my homeland,'' Dereen said. ''Then I go upstairs to my room and watch 'The Simpsons.' ''
Shayan Pasha, Dereen's mother, like all of the parents of the young cast members, had initial concerns about the project. ''I worried a lot about the hidden feelings inside of him,'' Mrs. Pasha said, in the audience for the preview performance. ''But after doing this his dark personality is more open. I can see his smile again, and for the first time he is talking about the future.''
It is a future, Dereen said before a recent rehearsal, that feels precarious because of new prospects of war. ''Saddam Hussein has caused my family much pain,'' said the teenager, whose boyish face and dark eyes carry the weighty seriousness of a much older man. ''But I still have hundreds of family members in Iraq. If we go to war, the United States will be killing my family, too. That's why I wanted to do this, so people would think about that.''
People, for instance, like Jan and Ron Stanley, who sat wiping away tears after the performance. ''This makes me think more about what I'm doing to make sure this stops happening,'' said Mr. Stanley, 44, an English teacher who taught the cast member Ms. Cuchilla last year, but who was hearing her full life story for the first time.
''Children of War,'' which runs through Dec. 15, cannot tour in the traditional sense. The cast members, after all, have school. But its creators hope it will be replicated in other cities with other refugee children. They are considering creating a video version of the production for educational and therapeutic use.
''With everything that's going on in the world right now,'' Mr. Chong said, ''I suspect this project will have a future.''
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