There is an almost unanimous theatre silence on the continuing slaughter of Palestinians. It is a silence out of step with the views of most of the country. It is an enforced silence that even Shakespeare would find it difficult to break, as the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester demonstrated by junking a five-week Midsummer Night’s Dream it had commissioned because it contained the word Palestine.
The Arts Council can rightly applaud and fund theatres that respond to the invasion of Ukraine, but it drew a line against any funding for Cutting the Tightrope despite the performance delivering twelve strong plays by thirteen established writers and a cast of eight.
The enforced silence is generating massive discontent among theatre workers. It was there on Thursday 28 November when thousands of them walked out in a UK response to the call by Palestine trade unions for a global workplace day of solidarity.
It is there in this powerful collection of short plays that takes us from a producer refusing the offer of a play about the murder of a six-year-old girl by Israel to the unsettling walk of a young Muslim women through Walthamstow on the day in August when the far right have organised a protest against migrants.
In Dare Not Speak, the producer Natalie (Ruth Lass) is finally having a long-delayed conversation with an imagined adult version of Hind (Sara Masry) who in real life was murdered by Israel at the age of six. When Natalie turns down Hind’s project, objecting to a show containing violence, Hind points out they did a show about the Second World War. Natalie argues, “that’s different… (The audience) feel it’s about the core of who they are.” Hind insists, “my play is about them also, because their tax money pays for the occupier’s weapons."
But then ruthless occupation is nothing new to the British government. In Maulvi, a British officer opens a package in 1857 to find the head of the Indian journalist Maulvi (Salman Akhtar), who was tied to a cannon and executed without a trial. However, the journalist’s head continues to ask pertinent questions and predicts the British will disappear.
Of course, these days in the UK, the powerful just use the promise of unemployment to silence any exploration of inconvenient subjects. It’s a reason why we are not told which writer wrote which play in this collection.
However, discouragement can come from our own family. There are a number of awkward silences in Suitable Subjects when a young man visits his fairly conservative parents with his partner who it turns out is doing an art show on the climate emergency and fundraising for medical aid to Palestine.
The Jewish mother of Metin (Issam Al Ghussain) in Catch Up is much more explicit when her son says he’s thinking of writing a play about Gaza, the genocide. She simply tells him he shouldn’t because he’s Jewish.
Gaza has provoked many an argument amongst people who identify as Jewish, and a fascinating version of that is reflected in one of the new additions to this collection that has the curious title: A Totally Imaginary, Unequivocally Made Up, Completely FICTIONAL Conversation That I Am Not In.
A famous liberal Zionist writer is giving a presentation when he is interrupted by an anti-Zionist Jewish playwright. The Liberal Zionist calls security, but not before their debate has challenged the Zionist ideas that get an easy ride most of the time.
The most powerful play in this collection is still 46 Women Attempt a Question, in which women from the audience rise from their seats as they individually ask questions that early on refer to the mistreatment of the Member of Parliament Diane Abbott, who was sitting on the front row at this performance.
They want to know why in the House of Jo Cox MP, who was murdered by a white racist, she was not allowed to speak in a debate about “a rich man who said: looking at Diane Abbott made him want to hate all Black women... And that she should be SHOT”.
Towards the end of this riveting play, a woman asks, ”how many women and children have to die before we all cry: ceasefire?”
Although the cast are consistently confident and engaging, Salman Akhtar gives a particularly moving performance in the often lyrical Burger and Chips as a Muslim walking through Walthamstow on the August day listed as a target for the far right.
As he walks through the area, she recalls aged six hearing of the killings in Srebrenica which were called a genocide. He remembers his uncle telling him “to look less Muslim for your own protection” and his “white friend’s mum telling you about your grooming gangs”.
It bothers him that, despite white racist gangs attacking homes and mosques across England and spitting “on women wearing hijabs, they won’t call it Islamophobic”. He grows nervous closer to Walthamstow Central where he sees “shutters down, boarded up shops... police”.
He feels “the tide is coming” but he must “rise above it”, and with relief, he spots people he knows from the Palestine demos among the thousands gathered at the centre in solidarity with migrants. It's an uplifting end to the show.
In contrast, a rather amusing performance piece opens the evening’s collection, reminding us how counterproductive censorship can be.
Israel has over the years restricted and even banned the Palestinian flag. In response, the watermelon, having the same colours as the flag, became a symbol for Palestine.
In Watermelon, a white theatre boss apologises to the audience for a comedian bringing a watermelon onto the stage. Alerted by the Daily Mail to the “racist” overtones this might carry, the theatre is to take action against the Watermelon. Unfortunately for him, between a number of the plays, a young man dances across the stage with a watermelon. Growing increasingly desperate, he pursues him. Finally catching up with him, he grabs the watermelon, raising it above his head only to have the man in shorts pull from it a flag he waves to a cheering audience.
It can stand as a metaphor for the stupidity of theatre’s censorship. Had the Royal Exchange not dumped its Shakespeare play because of its mention of Palestine, very few people would have known about it. Their ridiculous cancellation turned it into a front-page story in The Stage and a talking point across the country.
Cutting the Tightrope should be seen by everyone. Given the Arts Council were at the press night performance, perhaps they will fund a grand tour across the country.