"Faouk Al-Dakkeh"

Written by: Mounir Keserouani
Directed by: Berg Vazelian
Set design: Ghazi Qahwaji
Cast: Mireille Banousian, Hadi Khalil, Jamal Hamdan, Fadi Al-Rifaii, Maya Al-Assmar, Paul Abu-Karam, Jocelyne Ghali, Wissam Keserouani, Hassan Al-Ali, Claudine Ghali, and Mounir Keserouani.
Production management: Engineer John Al-Shaar
Technical Consultant: Ali Assi
Stage Manager: Mahdi Khalil
Set Construction: Ali Safa and sons
Sound: Khoder Sammouri
Light design: Jamal Shehadeh
Light operator: Abdel Hadi Al-Ashi
Photography: Elie Maaoushi, Michel Berzaghl
Props: Hassan Abboud, Ahmad Mahmoud
Lyrics set to music: Hadi Khalil
Lyrics written by: Poet Youssef Shalhoub

Ismail and Um Teaan, the two major characters of the play, become grandparents as their daughter, who lives in Beirut's southern suburbs, gives birth. They leave their village of Safd Al-Meqti in the South and come to visit their daughter and share her joy with her new baby boy. After spending two weeks with her, they return to their village. But when they arrive, they are shocked by the sight of their damaged house that was shelled by Israeli occupying forces.
Their house had lost its ceiling and all its contents were upside down. But what they discover underneath is a well that dates backs to the Roman era and a wall of mosaics. A director with his crew immediately arrive at the scene to cover live this great discovery.

Archeological expert and university professor Badih can be seen preparing himself for a live TV interview. The professor starts fighting with a number of brokers over the possession of the antiquities. They are competing for personal profits ignoring Ismail and Um Teaan who just want to live a decent life but have to face the occupation of their house in the name of the law and human values.

The play tackles in a sarcastic manner the conflict between the decent man and that group of opportunist people who build their happiness of the ruins of others. The play also embodies the loss of spiritual values. It deals with the subject from a humanistic angle. The events are set in a framework of sarcasm posing questions which give the play a special importance.

I hereby ask myself, why am I working in the art of the theater? Is it just a whim or a luxury? Or what? Who can identify his place in this world? I am trying to explore my self to know. I find my childhood in the land of the South, in Ayshieh-Jabal Rayhan, my first stage. An extraordinary nature that drags my imagination to dream, revolution, and change. My suffering started at school when I refused any kind of cheating, which was against the nature of my upbringing. In Beirut, I entered the Faculty of Arts and theater and started participating in the student struggle.

My theatrical works, "Wazara lel howwara", "Felet Limlaq", and "Faouq Al-Dakkeh", sprang from a pain I was living, a pain that I share with all the underprivileged people. It is a single concern, a single pain extending from the ocean to the gulf.

Concerning "Faouq Al-Dakkeh", I was inspired by an incident I read about in As-safir on July, 10, 1998 entitled: " Judicial moves to keep antiquities, a citizen destroys unearthed artifacts in Sidon."

Through this work, my writing experience gained depth. I leaned upon the work of Stanislav Stratiev, "A Roman Bathroom". I also benefited from the views of Director Berg Vazilian and artist Ghazi Qahwaji and Mireille Banousian, all of whom I was very happy to work with. I hope my work would help deepen our collective awareness of our destiny.

I would like to thank all journalists who attended this meeting. I also thank the Itani cinema company for cooperating with me. Finally, I would like to dedicate a special thanks to the Ministry of Culture and Higher Education that considered this play as part of events held to mark the declaration of Beirut as the Arab Cultural Capital for the year 1999.

Mounir Keserouani,
Piccadilly Theater October, 10, 1998

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