A PLAY THAT’S OUT OF THE BOX
Like an acrobat without a net who thrills us with her daring, Iranian-German playwright Nassim Soleimanpour offers a play with virtually no set, no costumes, and an actor doing a cold read of a completely unfamiliar script to keep an audience enthralled with his 75-minute work Nassim. On each night of the Boston run at The Huntington at Calderwood Pavilion, viewers will enter the theater to see only a simple table, a chair, and a file box on the stage. The performer of the night is told to open the file box, take out a single piece of paper, and read what it says to the audience. At last night’s opening, October 9, it was Jared Bowen, the New England arts correspondent for the PBS NewsHour and the host of The Culture Show, a daily public radio program devoted to local arts.
Most of the performers on other nights of the run are actors, but not all of them. They will include Boston Pops conductor Keith Lockhart, Boston Lyric Opera artistic director Nina Yoshida Nelsen, playwright and screen writer Mfoniso Udofia, and former Boston Celtics play-by-play announcer Mike Gorman. But this is not a simple vanity role. Bowen, a seasoned public figure, was visibly nervous as he came out on stage to face the prospect of performing a script he had never seen. He had no idea what to expect, and neither did we.
The good news is that Nassim offers not only numerous surprises, but many moments of humor. Soleimanpour credits Palestinian-Italian director Omar Elerian with inspiring the concept of the show by asking him to write a cold read that needed a director (Soleimanpour’s previous work, White Rabbit, Red Rabbit, does not have a director). Nassim has now been performed nearly 500 times in different locations around the world (but never in Iran). In each community, local “newscasters, community organizers, drag queens and … actors” bring the play to life without any prior rehearsal. It is not simply a script, but a series of instructions that shift the relationships between the performer and the playwright, the performer and the audience, and the audience and the playwright.
It’s a show that is “fueled by curiosity,” according to Soleimanpour. “Normally when people come to watch a show, they already have the context to gauge whether they like the show. But in Nassim, the support is stronger. People root for the guest [performer]. They want them to succeed. They feel for them. As long as you’re honest, people will embrace you, lift you up, tap you on the back, and help you achieve – which is very beautiful. It somehow helps all of us in the room to unite. The atmosphere is very friendly.”
Soleimanpour says that he has heard people say that Nassim is a machine “to make new friends.” There is a script written by Soleimanpour, yes, but many aspects of the production are improvised and unplanned. By the end of the show, through techniques that will challenge and delight, you may be speaking and understanding Farsi, Soleimanpour’s first language. Viewers also get glimpses of Iran as it once was, and hear many swear words and jokes about tomatoes.
“Languages,” Soleimanpour says, “can bring us together or tear us apart.” In Nassim, an audience is brought together by a language most of them have never heard before. Some people are doing everything they can think of to divide us and make people distrust one another. Instead of listening to them, see Nassim. It puts the power of creativity to work to affirm our shared experience across cultures.
photos of Jared Bowen by Mike Ritter
Nassim
Huntington Theatre Company
The Huntington at Calderwood Pavilion, BCA, 527 Tremont St. in Boston
ends on October 27, 2024
for tickets, call 617-266-0800 or visit Huntington