AMID THE CLOUDS [DAR MIYAN-E ABRHA]

A Play Written and Directed by Amir Reza Koohestani - Introduction

Venue:

Royal Court Jerwood Theatre Upstairs, Sloane Square, London SW1.

Dates and times:

13 - 23 July 2005. Monday - Saturday 7.45pm, Saturday Matinees 4pm.

Presented by:

The Royal Court in association with LIFT and the Iran Heritage Foundation.

Co-production with:

Mehr Theatrical Group, Wiener Festwochen, KunstenFESTIVALdesArts, in collaboration with Théâtre de la Bastille (Paris).

Supported by:

Visiting Arts.

Cast:

Shiva Fallahi, Hassan Madjooni.

Translated by:

Vali Mahlouji.

Introduction:

From the waters of the Ghara Ghaj to the English Channel, Imour remembers one image: being breast fed by his mother. That was the last time he saw her. Now, he just wants to get to England. Imour and Zina have not yet met, but they are travelling along the same road, on a journey that is to end in happiness and started out deep in the Iranian province. The pair have one thing in common: Imour does not know his father, and Zina does not know the father of the child she is carrying. There's something else: both are on the run, and both are stuck in a French refugee camp on the Pas-de-Calais, which day after day swallows some of their fellow refugees, those who give up their last crumbs of resistance and finally, powerlessly, surrender to its heavy waves.

Author and director Amir Reza Koohestani is interested in the incredible moments of happiness that can occur anywhere in the world and yet are bound to be followed by equally deep mourning and sadness. The moments when all life spreads out before you and you feel you can get lost in it - just like amid the clouds, where there is no beginning and no end. His young protagonists must first learn everything about each other to be allowed to lose each other.

Amid the Clouds was developed during the Royal Court's International Residency 2004, and first produced for the International Fadjr Festival in 2005. Amir Reza Koohestani is a writer and director whose award-winning plays Murmuring Tales and Dance on Glasses have been produced in Iran and across Europe, with the Mehr Theatrical Group.

Performed in Persian with English subtitles.

Tickets:

From 7.50 to 15.00 GBP.

Box Office:

44 20 75655000, book online at www.royalcourttheatre.com.