White Rabbit, Red Rabbit draws crowds at Arts Council on second and third day of World Culture Festival

KARACHI: Milan Kundera in his novel The Book of Laughter and Forgetting writes: “The only reason people want to be masters of the future is to change the past.” How does one change the past? One of the ways could be to arbitrarily control the present. The struggle against totalitarian regimes and mindsets (mindsets can also be tyrannical) is a topic that playwrights and novelists in the 20th century have often tried to deal with.

In the 21st century, too, things haven’t drastically changed. How to buck authority or not to disturb the status quo is still a relevant subject for creative men and women.

An experimental theatrical piece titled White Rabbit, Red Rabbit by Iranian writer Nassim Soleimanpour performed by Nadia Jamil and produced by Sarmad Khoosat on the second day of the World Culture Festival pulled in a large number of art lovers to the council’s auditorium.

The play was also performed by a different actor on Saturday — the third day of the mega event organised by the Arts Council of Pakistan.

First, a bit about Soleimanpour. When he was in his late twenties, his passport was taken away by Iranian authorities and therefore was not permitted to leave his country. Why? He refused his military service. So not being able to leave his homeland became a harrowing experience for him. In 2010, he wrote a piece for theatre in which an actor appears on stage without a script, unprepared. He doesn’t know what to do, nor do those who have come to watch the performance. As a result, an interaction takes place between the artist and the viewer. This implies a ‘shared’ experience, an intelligent way adopted by the playwright of putting his message across.

Now to the rabbit scenario. In a story told by the actor during her stint on stage, there is a bunch of rabbits trying to get to a carrot. They are white; and the rabbit who grabs the carrot first is given the colour red. Reminds one of a verse by Prof Sahar Ansari:

Bheed mein raasta banatey huay

Yaar, aghyaar kon dekhta hai

[Who thinks of kith and kin

While making his way up the ladder]

Nadia Jamil did alright on Friday evening. One, however, felt that the grimness that the material entailed didn’t fully come through. There were moments when the audience was laughing, which imparted the whole exercise a comedic touch, albeit dark.

Here it needs to be mentioned that the basic idea revolved around authority and obedience — that is, to what level authority can pull strings and how low an obedient person can stoop. It is an extremely thought-provoking theme and even the slightest shade of frivolity can dilute its gravity. It requires the kind of ruthless energy that the powerful exude, in any part of the world, to do as they please.

Also, and one could be wrong here, the members of the audience that Jamil called to come up on stage following her orders sat in the front and, one or two, in the middle rows. She didn’t go to those who sat at the back. It made the calling look a bit contrived.

Published in Dawn, September 29th, 2024