Unveiled – A drama review

A blog post by Eva Guldanová, friend from the Slovak republic who currently studies in Chicago, USA.

Review of  ”Unveiled”

Drama play by Rohina Malik

Many of us living in the Northern-Western hemisphere often know Muslims and the Muslim world mainly, if not only, from media – from the many sad news about terrorist attacks all over the world, and wars and violence in the countries in the Middle and farther East. Stories that make us shiver, make us feel that this world is very distant from ours and far behind ours as to its development and culture, stories that make us not really want to meet the other … because what good would we derive from such meetings? The image of the Muslim world in the “developed” Christian world is not a plausible one…one that caries a lot of fear. … fear that is not based on experience which we can trust, our own experience, but on distorted image that somebody from media whom we don’t even know imposed on us.

This image has been rapidly deteriorated after September 11, 2001…

Students, staff, and professors of our seminary – the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, and members of the Chicagoan Hyde Park community had one enigmatic evening in the middle of November the opportunity to encounter that world differently - through a play of promising nascent artist Rohina Malik.

Rohina Malik offers the opportunity to see the world on the other side of veil, through different eyes. She says: “… everywhere and everyday you hear about bomb attacks … nobody brings the good stories of Muslims”. Thus she – herself a Muslim of South Asian parents raised in the outskirts of London and now living in Chicago – uncovers the veil in the stories of four different Muslim woman and allows us to see the tears and tenderness, pain and love, humiliation and care for the others, these woman carry within themselves.

Four Muslim women in the drama play “Unveiled”, which is Rohina’s debut, all serve tea. Tea is a symbol of what is home for them, a symbol of safety, peace, openness, and hospitality that these Muslim women offer. While preparing and serving the tea they share their stories. They share them to encourage their guests to step outside of themselves and overcome the fear and shame … because sometimes “to keep silent is a crime”. They share the stories to show solidarity with the guests who are suffering to let the guests know that they are not alone. They share the stories also so that they themselves can take courage to rise and go farther. Behind the stories is the oppression they have undergone, but also resistance, pride, and inner strength, that “quiet strength of love and peace and carefulness”.

Each of the women is from a different country, they have different occupations and stand in different moments of their lives – from a Pakistani dressmaker in Chicago who makes dresses for weddings each of whom is like a piece of art, through a Moroccan-American who became lawyer after she violently lost her beloved one, through a young rapper and hip-hopper in London for whom wearing her hijab (the head scarf) is the symbol of her faithfulness to God, and of identity of which she – unlike her parents who came from Iraq – is not ashamed; to a Palestinian woman-mother in Chicago bringing her children to and from school in the dark day of 9/11. That day when her brother struggled to save lives in the Twin Towers while losing his own.

One thing that connects all these women is their desire for peace and friendly coexistence with all their neighbors, their love for their families, and the deep spirituality and essential meaning of their faith for their lives. The play is interwoven with quotations from Muslim holy scripture, the Qur’an, prayers, and thoughts stemming from the lived faith. It displays the beauty and the depth of faith these women have and share with others in their lives. It invites equally powerfully us Christians to reflect in the light of the faith of these women on the place faith has in our lives. These women wear their veils for God as much as a Christian nun does.

All the stories have their origin in events that really happened, but Rohina shapes their backdrop in a way that they would have both the beauty and the power that art can provide to express the reality as well as deeper meaning. The first one was inspired by her own experience when she went to a wedding of a close friend and somebody on the street shouted at her with contempt “Hey, get that shit off your head!” That story from the time after 9/11 became inspiration for writing the play. Others come from the stories that Muslim women and men shared with Rohina.

The performance was preceded by a reception in which all of the teas offered to the imaginary guests in the play were offered to the spectators who came to see the play. The drama was accompanied by live music of the Bulbul Ensemble featuring tunes and motifs coming from the countries of origin of the four women. After the performance followed discussion with the playwright and actor in one person – Rohina Malik.

Among the many things she shared with the interested audience was her desire to bring the play – which being a one-woman play with a very simple scene is easily transferable and playable in almost any environment – not only before audience in theatres in big cities, including one day maybe also in New York, but also to small towns where the people can rarely see a real drama play, and more over where the diversity is very little and all the information about the “other” comes from news in the media. To bring the play to these small towns would give the opportunity for the people in these places to see with their own eyes what is behind the veil.

Eva Guldanová