two Palestinians go dogging (NHB Modern Plays) E-Book

Sami Ibrahim

• Herausgeber: Nick Hern Books
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 100

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

The year is 2043, and Reem and her husband Sayeed are going to share a 'Serious Play about Palestine'. Things are tense. People are on the edge. The Fifth Intifada is right around the corner. But on a contested piece of land near their village of Beit al-Qadir, Reem and Sayeed are about to go dogging. Don't worry, you're allowed to laugh. Sami Ibrahim's play two Palestinians go dogging uses the lens of humour to explore how the everyday becomes political and the political becomes everyday in a conflict zone. The play won the Theatre Uncut Political Playwriting Award in 2019 and was premiered in May 2022 at the Royal Court Jerwood Theatre Upstairs, London, directed by Omar Elerian.

Leseprobe

Sami Ibrahim

two Palestinians go dogging

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

Original Production Details

Characters

two Palestinians go dogging

About the Author

Copyright and Performing Rights Information

two Palestinians go dogging was first performed at the Royal Court Jerwood Theatre Upstairs, Sloane Square, on 7 May 2022, with the following cast:

JAWAD

Luca Kamleh Chapman

SALWA

So a Danu

TARIQ

Joe Haddad

ADAM

Philipp Mogilnitskiy

REEM

Hala Omran

SARA

Mai Weisz

SAYEED

Miltos Yerolemou

Director

Omar Elerian

Designer

Rajha Shakiry

Associate Designer

Ruth Hall

Lighting Designer

Jackie Shemesh

Sound Designer

Elena Peña

Video Designer

Zakk Hein

Assistant Director

Alessandra Davison

Associate Lighting Designer

Lućia Sánchez Roldán

Fight Director

Bret Yount

Stage Managers

Rike Berg, Evelin Thomas

Stage Management Work Placement

Lottie Denby

Set built by

Royal Court Stage Department, Ridiculous Solutions & Weldfab Stage Engineering

From the Royal Court, on this production:

Casting Directors

Amy Ball & Arthur Carrington

Company Manager

Joni Carter

Stage Supervisor

TJ Chappell-Meade

Lighting and Video Supervisor

Max Cherry

Production Manager

Simon Evans

Lead Producer

Chris James

Costume Supervisor

Katie Price

Characters

REEM

SAYEED

JAWAD

SALWA

SARA

TARIQ

ADAM

And SOLDIERS, VILLAGERS, JOURNALISTS, PROTESTERS, DO-GOODERS

Time

Mid-2040s.

Place

A village called Beit al-Qadir – east of Jerusalem.

Notes

Chapter titles should mostly be screamed at the audience. A dash ( – ) indicates someone actively not speaking.

A sentence without a full stop is unfinished.

If possible, handkerchiefs embroidered with the flag of Palestine should be sold on the door as the audience enters, as well as during the interval.

This text went to press before the end of rehearsals and so may differ slightly from the play as performed.

ACT ONE

Storming Palestinian hip-hop.

House lights stay up, everyone chats.

REEM enters, clutching a piece of paper.

REEMI’m supposed to read this out before we start.

It’s from the guy who wrote this play.

Then she hands the paper to SAYEED. He reads it out:

SAYEEDWARNING

The play you are about to see is not pro-Palestinian.

Or pro-Israeli. Or anti-Israeli.

Or anti-Palestinian.

Or anything that is pro or anti anyone or anything that could possibly be construed as

REEMsnatches the piece of paper, throws it away.

REEMMy god, is this serious? Did he have a gun to his head when he wrote this?

REEM looks at the audience.

I’m starting with a joke: two Palestinians, couple of women, about to go dogging. It’s late at night, middle of nowhere, both getting in the mood, and one says to the other Man, you are gonna love it, there’s all these Arab hunks and you just get to fuck ’em. and the other one’s like

Yum.

and the first one goes

Sometimes, I wish some Israelis would turn up, cos I’d sling on a strap-on and fuck them, right in the arse, fuck them so hard they’ll know what it’s like to get occupied. and the other one goes

Oh snap cos the first one’s just been tied up, arrested, slung into the back of a van, and you thought this was a joke, but it’s not, it’s serious, this is a Serious Play About Palestine.

No one is allowed to laugh.

So fuck you, go home, have some respect – here’s the prologue:

Two Palestinians Go Dogging

Beat.

I’m kidding – of course you can laugh.

But only if I say something funny.

And dogging is not funny.

SAYEEDIt’s quite funny.

REEMShut up Sayeed.

That’s Sayeed, by the way.

Reem and Sayeed: I’m the clever one, he’s the twat.

SAYEEDPlease don’t call me a twat.

REEMBut I love him really. We’re gonna go dogging. Aren’t we?

SAYEEDI hope so.

REEMOf course we are, but first – we are gonna need a lot of context.

The year is twenty forty-three.

Half of you are dead, the other half are voting Tory, things are tense.

People are on edge, the Fifth Intifada is right around the corner.

And we’ll get to that in a minute but right now, we’re gonna have outdoor sex.

Two important things about where we are. Number one: we are on a contested piece of land, near to our village of Beit al-Qadir, which is next to a settlement, which is east of Jerusalem.

Strict security, IDF patrols.

Number two: for Palestinians, this is a dogging hotspot.

Every Thursday.

We get turned on by the risk.

I’m serious: google it.

VILLAGERS join them, one by one.

They all assume the dogging position.

It starts with a bit of touching.

We’re not completely naked, just pants-round-the-ankles-sort-of-thing.

Small group of us – but people come and go.

–

That’s funny, by the way, that deserves a bigger laugh: come and go.

Whatever.

Things start heating up.

You can feel all the rough Palestinian hands. All slipping over each other, scraping, sparks flying, as our hands fumble and sweat – and sometimes nails scratch, and blisters catch, and it’s all desperate. A bit too panicked, a bit too clammy.

They all start growling – like dogs.

And as the dogging heats up, the growls will turn to barks, will turn to full-on climactic howling.

And I know it’s dark but my eyes are getting used to it so I can make out Sayeed’s outline as someone grabs on to him. I can see a hand connected to an arm, to a body, and I can’t tell if the body’s a man or a woman but it doesn’t matter cos it’s

It’s nice.

So I help – I grab on to Sayeed. And someone tries grabbing on to me.

It’s very nice.

They focus on me as I focus on Sayeed. And we all just keep going.

And going.

And going.

And

And

And

AND

Climax.

Blackout.

Searchlights.

Panic and shouts.

Gunshots.

Silence.

Lights up.

REEM is standing. Everyone else is crouched on the floor.

And sometimes we get caught. Everyone alright?

VILLAGERS pick themselves up, brush themselves down. They start to clear out.

SAYEEDjoins REEM.

I mean, it’s worth the risk. But sometimes we get caught. Question:

If a Palestinian doesn’t have an IDF sniper trained on them, are they even a Palestinian? Don’t answer, it’s a stupid question, we just love dogging.

Right.

Who wants to play a game? Anyone?

C’mon, have some enthusiasm – chapter one:

Bibi Says

Which is a bit like Simon Says.

Except with Bibi – and Bibi is the nickname for Benjamin Netanyahu.

I don’t know about you but I think ‘Bibi’ is a very cute nickname for a man who is quite obviously a cunt.

I’m joking, I’m joking, it’s a joke, I’m joking.

But he is a cunt.

Bibi says… put your hands on your head.

Beat.

SAYEEDThe woman’s telling you to put your hands on your head.

The audience does so.

REEMThere we go, that’s better!

Bibi says… start clapping.

Bibi says stop clapping!

Um… stamp your feet.

Very good, you remember the rules to Bibi Says!

Bibi says… be complicit in the oppression of the Palestinian people.

Phwoar that’s a bit much, isn’t it?

This is meant to be a fun night out.

Bibi says build a settlement – BAM!

A settlement pops up – some SOLDIERS build it.

Bibi says build another settlement – BAM!

And another pops up.

Okay… Destroy a settlement.

Ahhhhh, that’s not what Bibi says!

Bibi never says destroy a settlement. What a laugh. What else does he say?

Bibi says make Jerusalem our eternal and undivided capital.

SAYEEDBibi says move the embassy.

REEMBibi says it’s just self-defence.

SAYEEDBibi says this is a bit of a pro-Palestinian love-in.

REEMBibi says try to see our perspective.

SAYEEDBibi says ‘Israel will not rest until the death of Sara Yadin is avenged.’

REEMBibi says

SAYEEDwho’s Sara Yadin?

REEMWhich is a good question.

SAYEEDI know.

REEMAnd we should answer it.

SAYEEDAbsolutely.

REEMSara Yadin is an Israeli.

And she’s dead.

SAYEEDAnd Bibi wants to know, how did she die?

REEMAnother excellent question.

Cos I’m here to tell you about the Fifth Intifada.

And if I want to do that, I gotta start with the death of Sara Yadin – chapter two:

There’s a Bloke on the Telly Talking About His Dead Daughter

The telly is on – Bibi and ADAM stand next to each other.

SAYEEDReem?

REEMYes.

SAYEEDThere’s a bloke on the telly talking about his dead daughter.

REEMIs that right?

SAYEEDOh yes.

REEMBefore we go on, have you noticed that my husband’s a bit thick?

SAYEEDExcuse me?

REEMWhat?

SAYEEDWhat did you say?

REEMNOVEMBER TWENTY FORTY-THREE

The start of the Intifada.

And we’re jumping ahead here, but the bloke on the telly is called Adam.

SAYEEDA bit wet, crying a lot, arm in arm with Bibi.

REEMHis dead daughter is Sara Yadin.

And he stands next to Bibi, on the telly, talking about her.

SAYEEDBy the way, at this point Bibi is old.

REEMHe got kicked out of office.

SAYEEDRemember that?

REEMHe divorced, he faced corruption charges, he beat corruption charges, he remarried, he became head of the UN, he got fired, he remarried again, he even died – but they resurrected him and his reanimated corpse became prime minister.

He is eternal.

Bibi and Adam, Adam and Bibi at a press conference because the body of Sara Yadin has been found.

And Adam says he’s sad that his daughter is dead.

SAYEEDWhich you would be, wouldn’t you.

REEMAnd Bibi nods along for a bit – very sad, very sad

SAYEEDAnd then he says

REEMHe declares

SAYEEDIsrael will not rest until the death of Sara

Yadin is avenged.

REEMSo what happens?

SAYEEDIsrael does not rest until the death of Sara

Yadin is avenged.

REEMNow ‘avenged’ is a very fluid term.

SAYEED takes out a dictionary: he’s a pedant and this is his prop.

SAYEEDThe Oxford English Dictionary says: ‘To exact reasonable satisfaction for a wrongdoing by punishing the wrongdoer.’

REEMExcept Bibi is not the kind of pansy who sticks to definitions.

SAYEEDNo.

REEMNo, he doesn’t want reasonable satisfaction –

Bibi wants to cripple a nation.

But we are Palestine.

We like to fight back.

SAYEEDWe like to have an Intifada.

REEMDefine ‘Intifada’.

SAYEED flicks through his dictionary.

SAYEEDThe Oxford English Dictionary says: ‘a Palestinian uprising against the Israeli occupation of

REEMIt’s when Palestinians are pissed off at being endlessly oppressed so we chuck a whole load of rocks.

SAYEEDAnd sometimes we fire rockets. And plant bombs. And

REEMAnd we’ve already had four of them.

SAYEEDAnd Bibi reckons he can handle another.

REEMAnd we reckon, he doesn’t stand a chance – chapter three:

The Mess We’re Stuck In

SAYEED joins the VILLAGERS, who build the village of Beit al-Qadir – they manoeuvre around Israeli settlements to do so. There’s a lot of chain-metal fences, barbed wire, concrete – REEM makes her voice heard above the construction.

First things first:

before the Intifada, we’ve gotta backtrack, cos Sara Yadin doesn’t just die, just like that, she’s killed.

By three Palestinians.

Except you should know that these

Palestinians are kids.

And these kids don’t just kill Sara cos they want to do it, they do it cos there’s a context. And maybe they’re murderers, maybe they don’t deserve a context, but I reckon everyone deserves a context.

And maybe I’m biased but I don’t care, I’m gonna give them a context.

The context is Beit al-Qadir.

Last Palestinian stronghold on the West Bank.

A ‘Welcome to Beit al-Qadir’ sign is put up.

AUGUST TWENTY FORTY-THREE

We’re an hour east of Jerusalem.

Surrounded by Israeli settlements.

And our village is declared illegal.

Which means the Israelis want to demolish it and replace it with a settlement.

Now, most people reckon Bibi likes to build settlements because he’s an arsehole, but he’s actually doing it because he’s an arsehole.

Beat.

SAYEEDI like that joke.

REEMMe too.

The real explanation is this: one road runs north to south along the West Bank – it connects Northern Palestine to Southern Palestine.