الرحيل
Al Raheel
Al Raheel is a 50 minutes performance created by Emirati writer Reem Almenhali and American director Joanna Settle, co-commissioned by The Arts Center at NYU Abu Dhabi and Cultural Foundation. In the performance, Arabic and English poetry are weaved with projected images and movement.
The themes of innocence, womanhood, and the future are explored in this production, which reflects on a body that grows in a world that changes. The performance has been collaboratively developed from a series of poems written in response to women persisting and developing across childhood, womanhood, and aging.
Production credits
Writer & Performer: Reem Almenhali
Director: Joanna Settle
Assistant Director: Sadaf Habib
Set Designer: Marsha D. Ginsberg
Lighting Designer: Simon Jonathan Fraulo
Projection Designer: Fatema Al Fardan
Performer: Maitha AlSuwaidi
Performer: Maryam Khalifa Alshehhi
Performer: Sara Rasheed
Photographer: Waleed Shah
SCRIPT EXCERPTS
عمداً,ونقداً
Deliberately & In Cash
Deliberately and In Cash is a 35 minutes lecture performance that explores the practice of collecting Diya (blood money) in the Gulf.
The performance traces how the practice was in the tribal laws from pre-islamic times, how it got incorporated into Sharia law and eventually made its way to our modern justice and law systems.
The piece looks closely at how the practice of collecting Diya money persists today in the Gulf by featuring the case of Hidaya Salem Al Sultan. Whose Diya is considered one of the highest ever collected in the recorded history of the practice. Hidaya, the Kuwaiti journalist got murdered by a policeman in 1991 for writing an article about the women of a certain tribe working as paid dancers.
The piece argues that what makes this practice persist is that it provides a mechanism to distribute the responsibly and the punishment of the crime on the society that allowed the murder to happen. The piece invites the audience to think about how this mechanism can be used in order to reduce potential violent acts and re-evaluate tribal values.
SCRIPT EXCERPTS
تمائم من سعف
Amulets of Palm
Amulets of Palm is a Collaboration between Reem Almenhali and the artist Maitha AlSuwaidi. It is a multimedia performance that features magical narratives surrounding palm trees and the people of the palm. This performance uses poetic and visual forms of fiction to capture the palm as a mystical soul, an abundant ground, and an entity. Amulets of Palm showed in Alserkal Avenue as part of the More Than Human festival, then later evolved into a short film showcased at Art Basel in Basel, Switzerland.
في كل نهمة قصة
A Tale To Every Nahma
Developed for Abu Dhabi’s Maritime Heritage Festival by DCT, Reem was the creative director of A Tale To Every Nahma, collaborating with the festival’s team, heritage experts Mubark Al Otiba, Ali Khamis Al Suwaidi, and film and stage director Abdullah Hassan.
The development process to create the overarching narrative of the show involved interviewing the traditional ship captain, meeting the Dalma Museum curator, researching national archives, and acquiring material from photography archives in the UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Qatar.
The cast included over 60 performers: actors from the UAE and traditional performing bands from the UAE, Bahrain, and Kuwait.
The show features the inspiring story of Yomaa Bin Hathboor, a traditional ship captain, and his journey from a young ship assistant to a master of the seas. Yomaa shares his unique relationship with the traditional vocal art of Hadwat Al Tohoraib, considering this chant a mnemonic device allowing him to access memories of a past time.
As the story unfolds, the audience witnesses silent deals among pearl merchants in Dalma's seasonal market, brought to life with the rhythms of the Gulf’s Adasani and the Emirati traditional art of Ah-Allah. The journey culminates in Muharraq with a celebration of Al Mokholfi. The performance is a tribute to the Gulf's enduring maritime culture, inviting audiences to experience the rich tradition and camaraderie of these arts.
هامور لا يغادر المكتب
Hamour Doesn’t Leave the Cubicle
Rooted in Emirati culture through its workplace references and humor, but with universal resonances, Hamour Doesn’t Leave the Cubicle is an absurd play that uses satire to critique real-life bureaucratic inconveniences faced by employees anywhere in the world. The play takes you to a world where the mundane meets the extraordinary, revealing different levels of bureaucracy that the characters navigate in every act, from writing an email to holding a funeral for a pen.
Thought-provoking and entertaining, performed in Arabic with English subtitles, Hamour Doesn’t Leave the Cubicle encourages viewers to re-evaluate work processes, emphasizing the power of humor as a tool for reflection.
Production credits
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Director: Reem Almenhali
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Playwright: Ahmed Almadloum
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Producer: Aida Allowch
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Set Designer: Ruqaya Alhashimi
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Lighting Designer: Carlos Páez
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Sound designer: Spencer Hogg
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Costume Designer and Props Maker: Wadeema Al Hammadi
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Prop Master: Rodha Almazrouei
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Projection Designers: Sarah Ahmed and Mansour AlHeera
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Translator: Abduallah Al-Jasmi
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Actors: Mad-Rabdan, Abdullah Al Qassab, and Shahad Alsaqqaf
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Extra Actors: Mohammad Arwani, Hassan El-Tahir
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Photographer: Waleed Shah
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Special thanks to our interns: Samira Babiker and Awadh Almehiri
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Commissioned and produced by Abu Dhabi Music and Arts Foundation (ADMAF)
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Touring support by the Ministry of Culture
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Co-Presented by ADMAF and The Arts Center New York University Abu Dhabi
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Special thanks to M39 and the SEAF studio Miza for providing rehearsal spaces