By Anthony Stoeckert
From the Princeton Packet
The main character of Ayad Akhtar’s Pulitzer Prize- winning play “Disgraced” calls Islam a “backward way of thinking,” says the religion draws no distinction between church and state, and points to a passage in the Quran that states men are in charge of women, and gives men permission to beat women if they do not obey.
This character isn’t someone who’s ignorant of the religion, he is a former Muslim, a self-described apostate, who claims that according to the Quran, he could be punished by death.
The experience of Muslim Americans is a prominent theme of Mr. Akhtar’s work, and it is one that has resulted in much acclaim, along with some criticism that his plays are unfair to Islam. In an interview with “The Washington Post” earlier this year, Mr. Akhtar said he understands and respects that reaction, but he can’t control his artistic obsessions because if he does, the work will have no vitality and no one will care about it.
“(T)hey’re not going to feel connected to it in a personal way if they don’t share my background,” he said in the report. “That’s the goal, is to reach a kind of — universality? — something in everyone.”
The report also noted that “Disgraced” is the most produced play of the year, and a production directed by Marcela Lorca is on stage at McCarter Theatre in Princeton through Oct. 30.
In the play Amir (played by Maboud Ebrahimzadeh) is a successful Manhattan lawyer, married to Emily (Caroline Kaplan), an up-and-coming artist whose work is greatly inspired by Islam. As much as Amir has rejected his religion, he fights to keep his culture alive, and argues with his nephew, who has changed his name from Hussein to Abe.
A colleague of Amir’s, Jory (Austene Van), is married to Isaac (Kevin Isola), who owns a gallery and is fascinated by Emily’s work. The four have dinner together, setting the stage for a sparks-flying scene that has drawn comparisons to “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”
Mr. Ebrahimzadeh says the play does not represent Islam, but rather one character’s view of the religion.
“It’s one guy who wants nothing to do with it,” Mr. Ebrahimzadeh says. “He wants nothing to do with Islam, he wants nothing to do with the assumptions made about Islam and as a matter of fact, he kind of plays against type in the arguments he makes.”
He adds that Amir is going through a cultural struggle, of cultural identity as opposed to religious identity.
“One of the things that tends to happen in the United States when dealing with Islam is, we tend to lump culture and religion into one, and it gets very, very tricky to (differentiate) between the two, when you’re talking about a faith practiced by millions of people,” he says.
He adds that it’s a play in which characters say things that seem cold, even disgusting, but that there is a lot going on with these characters and their situation.
“When you look closer and you’ve really, truly listened to the play, and you remove judgment and bias, you start to be able to hear the truth underneath it,” Mr. Ebrahimzadeh says. “You start to hear the nuance and the troubles that each of the characters is facing.”
“Disgraced” is being performed at McCarter Theatre, 91 University Place, Princeton, through Oct. 30. For tickets and information, go to mccarter.org or call 609-258-2787.
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