 life. Welcome, everybody back to Siegel talks here at the Mockney Siegel Theatre Center at the Graduate Center CUNY, the City University of New York. And it is still springtime, but fresh and cold. And and the outlook is not clear what will happen in this crisis, we all go through together. It's, these complicated times, times where we are confronted with our selves with what we do and what we don't do actually with existential questions like death and life and what to do and what we're going to do. Yesterday, we had Natalia Brosbitt from Ukraine and she had a very bleak outlook, saying that she almost lost faith in theater, the wars going on for six years in the Crimea area. She feels something really bad is happening after the corona is over for and for her, the corona time is almost like a holiday time out of of a bleak bleak existence as an as an artist and and so she shared with us her outlook and today we have two guests, great artists from Palestine and it is Amir Tsoabi who I would like to welcome and Fidazi Dan to two great workers of the vineyard in theater globally and also with connections to to New York through productions here with Bonn-Estein and others and and Ellison. So how are you guys? Where are you? What time is it? Fidat? Yeah. Hello. Hey, now I'm in Haifa. I'm in Haifa city, but originally I'm from a village from the north Palestine. It's called Bejan. And so I'm in Haifa. So the weather is very nice today. If I go north and go back to my village, it will be colder because it's high. So for now, the weather is good. That's fantastic. And it's about six o'clock, seven o'clock in the evening. Yes, seven o'clock. Yeah. And also the coast of Palestine in a city called Jaffa. And yeah, it's about to become sunset and you'll hear some explosions, but that's firework because of Ramadan. So yeah, it's the last week, I guess, right? The last week and soon there's going to be the breaking of the fast. So usually it becomes a bit louder. It becomes a bit louder. So how is it playing out? The corona situation? Are you under constraints? We go out and now you said, are you forced to stay in the apartments? What's going on? Well, we're Palestinians, but we live in what is today Israel. So under Israeli jurisdiction and Israel was one of the first countries to react quite drastically to the corona. And it was pretty well contained. We were under confinement for about a month and a half. But the death toll did not climb that high. Of course, it's always horrible, but our death toll is quite low. And as of last week, they started opening up and easing the measures and we're almost back to normal. We're flirting with normality. So we're on the opposite side of the spectrum from a place like New York right now. So you were for five, six weeks, you were at your homes, you were not allowed to go out or how did that work? Yeah, basically, you were in lockdown, you were allowed to be in 100 meters parameter from your house. And you could go out shopping or to buy medicine, but that was what was allowed. Or sports, but and most, most unessential work has been stopped. Now it's all come back. So except restaurants and theaters, I think we're pretty much back to approximate normality. So yeah, that was the law of the land up until a week ago. But they started opening up gradually. And I think this week, primary schools have opened up as well. So kids are starting to go back to school. And slowly, slowly, it seems as if by mid summer, we will be completely back to normal unless we get hit by a second wave, which is what everybody's dreading. Fida, how was it for you? And is it the same? Well, I just when when we come back from New York, basically from America, which was in February, like a few weeks before the quarantine here and all the corona started to grow up. So I go I go back to my village. So I left Haifa, the city and I go back to my village. And then for me, it was kind of I I felt I, of course, it was the same. We are not allowed to go out. But I felt much free in the in the village because then I can go out much and hide. And so I spend a lot of time in the mountains and with my parents. I didn't go a lot. I didn't go out because I was really aware about my parents because they are old. So yes, I felt that there is some, you know, prison that I can go out or like, I don't want to start maybe to start to talk about the stuff that counseled, you know, all the world that counts and all stuff. But but at some point, it was at the beginning, it was hard because also, I can't move with my car. And this was something really new for me that usually I moved from the village to Haifa to Turamalla, but then also I'm stuck that I can't drive. So yeah, it wasn't easy. Yeah, that's that's not easy. You're also part of the Drew's minority, right? He said, did that, did that somehow make a difference in the experience of it? Or was your family or your Probably there is no, I mean, you know, the Drew's in Palestine, which is now, you know, they live in the 48 theory, and they are territory, and they are, you know, they are in, they are Arab villages. So the situation in that with the Drew's is like most of the other Arab villages in Israel, which is it doesn't, you know, that that let's say that the situation, there is not a lot of infected in the Arab villages, but also we don't really know, because the, you know, the care or the review that is the Israeli review that they have about Arab villages, they are not really specific. And they are just to start to to make this test just the last the last month. So at the beginning in Israel, they take care, you know, as as as any country that it goes through distress, that at the beginning, they take care from their favorites, and then the Arab city, the Arab villages, they start to deal with it. So the Drew's, they are, you know, the same that the other Arab villages situation. So how is the situation for US theater artists at the moment? What are you working on? What are your planning? Can you work? Well, I noticed that at the in the beginning, I noticed that, okay, maybe I'll not be able to write in this time that I need to be at home right now. So I started to read, I said, okay, I need to read. So I put emissions and the list that for stuff that I need to read a lot of stuff canceled. So we try to continue and zoom on email, like small projects that start to we start to work on it. But like, one of them, we cancel it and remove it because it's really hard for us to connect through this through this virtual meetings. So it was for me, it was really, really hard in the beginning. Now, I'm a bit get used to it. Because also, I'm not a person who, you know, I know to write here, to go to Gmail. I don't like other web or stuff or to search material. So it's not easy for me, but I continue on. I'm reading now, I'm doing a few researches and trying to, I mean, I'm also I'm a freelance. So this life to be at home and kind of have a free and a lot of time. So I use to this, this times but but still that the prison or the quarantine, it was something inside. It wasn't like, even that I'm in the village and can't go out. But still it's something inside. It's everything canceled. I don't know what to do in the future and how I will do it and how I will replan all the stuff again. And when so this is how I spend I still spent my days with this though. So you couldn't really write or I know you're a performer and the director and writer, but you could read a lot. That was your yeah, I go I go back to the stuff that I wrote before and trying to do some editing all the time. But probably I'm reading I'm doing also. Now I me and my friend, Mona Hawa, she's an actress also our friends. We are working on a play for children. And we are, we just spent a few days in my village writing and doing the, you know, think about the play and and and we start to write. So this is one thing that we are doing. And also, and I'm certain I'm doing research with my friend, John, John Rose Omak from London, he's originally from Uganda with remote theater project with Alex around. And so we're doing we're doing the research right now about the new project that we want to do. So what what is in common with us material about Palestine, Uganda, the UK, Israel. So this length we are trying to find there is a lot of course, but for now we are search around the prison, basically, in this different countries. Yeah. Yeah. So so I'm your how is it for you? Well, it was a very, very, very intense period for me because I kept after we came back from a very pompous tour of gray rock that was created by remote theater project. And we were in New York and the public and in the Kennedy Center, then the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, finishing off in the Kimmel Center. And then we flew home. I I continued working internationally until mid March, because I'm, I'm directing I was commissioned to create a show in Stockholm. So I went to do castings. And I'm involved in a big international project, which I'm still not at liberty to share, but it happened next year. And on the 16th of March, I flew back home to a very different reality, because these three weeks where I was abroad is where the country clamped down. I was sent to isolation for two weeks. You were sent that meant not to your home to you basically I was lucky enough to have I have a studio so I could use that but it was you need to be a you need to be isolated, or else you risk infecting your family. And because I was globetrotting. A day after I came back, I got a phone call from friends in London, who I had dinner with, who said, you will be ill in a couple of days. And lo and behold, I was, which meant that my quarantine became much longer. So you had actually the coronavirus? Yeah, I tested positive. And then I was basically isolated for almost seven weeks without seeing anyone for seven weeks. Yeah. And how was it? How did it feel and it was, it was the mizentrop in me says it was gorgeous. The humanist in me says it was a nightmare. It was very, very mixed, you know, suddenly you have too much time, we always kind of go, we don't have time, we don't have time. But when we actually are gifted time, in that quantity, it's very hard to be created. So I also felt quite bad for the first two week and a half, then it got much better. But my symptoms were mild, but I was mainly tired. And very, very alone. So I did use the time I did finish the draft for the Stockholm show. So that was productive. And continued working on my big other project. But yeah, it sends you thinking it sends you What did you think about? What did you think about? You know, we're Palestinians. We grew up with strife. The world, you know, I think that one outlook that we have inherently is the world was never safe for us. You know, in the West, something about the relative safety, the fake relative safety of the world always existed until now, or at least since World War Two. So for me, the world being unsafe is not a new thing, in a way, psychologically. I knew it's a hostile place. This, it's always in grinder somehow because we grew up in conflict. But this was different because inside this very isolated reality where you can't meet people where you're asked to not be close to anyone where all this the social distancing, the isolation that you suddenly confront yourself naked. And it's not always a pretty sight. So there was a lot of soul searching on my end. And at the same time, you kind of, there is, there is this sense of we are one on this planet, we're homo sapiens, regardless of the distances, regardless of a virus is putting us to our knees, and it's putting us to our knees in the same way everywhere. Different reactions, different measures taken. But at the same time, there was in the midst of this complete isolation, for me, at least, psychologically, there was also a weird unity, the unity of calamity, where we're all interconnected on this. And then a lot of reflections about what does it mean from here forward? What does it mean for my profession? In the short run, but also in the longer run? I'm not as bleak as our Ukrainian friend. I think there will always be a need for us to huddle in big groups and listen to a story. But you do start thinking about what is the infrastructures and are the classical infrastructures the right way? Or has this pandemic revealed by accident, like revealed in other options? Where the big institutions that have all the power and all the kind of infrastructure are irrelevant in a matter of weeks? And suddenly, a platform like zoom becomes relevant, which is democratic, open for all, and everybody can have his own stage, you know, or outdoor performances that will happen eventually will first move into. So I think rethinking what the venues, what the structures are is a good way to think about it positively instead of just going. So yeah, it's been a very interesting period for me. I've been back and forth in the pendulum from utter despair and kind of going, this is gonna end badly to it's okay, this is ha, this is manageable. And of course, one of the things that because I'm, I'm spending a lot of my days on zooms with colleagues from all over Europe, you see that it's very unique because every place was hit, we were all hit by the same thing, but we were hit differently. So or in different stages. So working with the Swedes now, Sweden is practically ignoring it. Psychologically, they're ignoring it. And life is continuing as normal. And nobody kind of it's almost rude to talk about it on some level. Yeah, there's that as well, but we don't care. The Brits with their stiff upper lip and kind of World War Two, we save the world's mentality. A month after us have been put to their knees. And right now everything seems very bleak. The Mediterranean has been hits more likely, you know. So I think we we're in different phases of the pandemic, but we also were hit differently, you know, when you read the death tolls coming out of London or the States. It's shocking. It's absolutely abhorring and shocking. And kind of just go what mad? We had 230 people, you know, it's relatively, oh, yeah, very low. Yeah. Fida, how is it for you when you listen to a tour to Amir at Onizah? What did you sort of search for your soul? And if so, what did you find? First of all, I'm happy to see Amir also in zoom because since we come back from the tour, I didn't see him. Yes, Amir, I didn't see you after you come back. Yeah. So I did this, I did a lot of conversation with myself and also with their relatives and family and friends. Because I suddenly, in the beginning, I didn't accept the whole situation. And then, like this the first week, and then my parents, they are they were really like, worry about me. And then that's why I start also to, to relax and to be more careful. But what I what I noticed at some point that long time, I guess, maybe 40 years, I didn't take this break. And suddenly, there is, I have nothing to do, I just need to accept it to accept the situation at it is because usually I don't. And if I don't accept situation, so I go and break it and do just do what I think that is right. But now in this situation, like there's, it was a fact for me. So when when I realized that now, after a long time, I didn't, I didn't have this space and this time that probably all the time I wanted it. But when it comes, so and as also what Nisar said in the beginning, so suddenly when you have all of this time, when I have when I had all of this time, so I said, Okay, so I wanted to, to do more and to do a lot. Suddenly, I wanted to end all the stuff that I didn't end to write it in a few weeks, but I couldn't. And and also just so I quite learned also to know how to to use or to accept to accept what what's happening or what what is going around and to take this breath. But but also it's, it's it's confused because in the other way, like, there is a lot of news that you that, you know, that you that you read about this COVID-19, the corona that it had mentioned before many years, maybe 10 years that that they talked about it. So, or they accepted it or one year before before now. And like, people start to negotiate about the equipment that they want to sell to this medical for the corona. So you get confused. You don't know sometimes. And but what weird for me also, right now that everything will stop now stuff like things are started to go back to the normal. And it almost it more. We I feel like we are almost forget we will forget about this soon. So and this is weird for me. This is was like, like how suddenly that's it. This is this is a virus. It's just disappeared like this. And also with the whole the old political stuff here that we have in like in Palestine, and in the 48 in Israel and the political situation. So it makes me to think a lot. But slowly, I didn't want to to be so obsessive about this situation. It's like a fashion and will, of course, not a fashion. It's people people get sick and people are died from this. But it just at some point, yes, I wanted to pass all of this thoughts and dilemma about around this situation. And yeah, I can I can talk a lot about about the stuff that like this this this time makes me makes me feel or makes me think, you know, suddenly I go back like a lot of friends that suddenly appear. So it's I feel like sometimes I go I I what it's it's what mainly was in this time, it's like people go start to stare inside and be more connected with natural environment that they come from. But for both of you, how how was the reality of making theater in Palestine? And we don't know enough about it, of course. And and you're the ones who also travel internationally. So you know a little bit of both worlds through gray rock and Alex and Bonnie, but they know about it. But how how how is it normally, even without a virus? And what will happen afterwards? Sorry, everything froze for a second. Yeah. Hi. You know, Palestine's theater scene is very unique. It's unique because of course, we don't have a central government or funding or infrastructure or anything. So it's down to almost an act of guerrilla art, most of the time. We don't have a theatrical tradition. Really. So it's a relatively a new art form as well. But with that said, I think that we are equipped with the one thing that is the key requirement for theater is that we have something viable to say, not only politically, I think, living in this very ancient clan that had that basically is the cradle of Western civilization. We live here. We've been creating stories on this tiny stretch of land for millennia. And what I can tell you about this, the scene is that it's basically it's led by individuals. It's not led by institutions. It, it has the freedom of not adhering to a tradition. It has the advantages and the disadvantages of this of this, we're very free. I can pretty much do whatever I want theatrically. I don't need to climb up the rands of an institution in order to fulfill my dreams. I just, I just make them. But with that, it means I make them from scratch. There is no comfort. I think one of the amazing things and I worked internationally for the last 20 years, I've been, I was an associate director of the Young Vic, which is one of London's best theatres. I've worked all over. One of the things that keep bringing me back to Palestine is that the people that get involved in theatre in Palestine are unique. They're unlike anywhere else because everything, everything is against that. So people that defy reality to that extreme are very, very special and they have something to say and working, so being surrounded by people like Fida and the other really talented actors that I'm very privileged to work with is a great gift for me. I'm, you know, I, I had the, I had the luxury of doing shows in the RSE and doing shows in, in a makeshift theatre in Ramallah. They're both great. I wouldn't, I wouldn't want to lose any of them. But there's some integrity and honesty about doing something in shoestring budgets with a big dream that is for me key. For me, it, it, it touches the basis of what theatre is about. It's not about big production value. It's not about prestige. It's about sharing a moment and a story with another human being and that you can do anywhere. You can do a round of bonfire and that, that, that's part of the reason why with the hardship that our industry is going through in this, this pandemic is disastrous for what we do is the key ingredient in theatre is people sharing a moment together. And that's hard to do right now. But with that, I still insist on remaining an optimist about the importance. You know, in 2000, when the second Intifada started, and the second Intifada was very, very violent when it started, it was war, you know, bullets were flying in the streets. It was war. The one thing that was very reassuring and beautiful is that people needed theatre. People came when we did shows, people came through the checkpoints, through the clash points, came to spend time with other people. And I think that need will never go away. We're pack animals at the end. I think that's why Corona is so hard for us psychologically, because it removes us from our most instinctual behavior, which is to huggle in big groups. So doing theatre in Palestine is probably creating art in the one of the most hostile environments in the world, but also one of the most rewarding acts you can do. So I feel very lucky to be a Palestinian director. Fida, what do you say? I agree. He is my director. I will say anything he will say. I think it's like, it's not easy, but I can't imagine myself, for example, doing something else. Maybe I can buy some, I don't know, bread or falafel instead of doing theatre, because this is what I know, but it's not easy. The material that the Palestinian theatre use or people who are doing theatre in Palestine, I think there is something really special also about the need of the material that or about the material that the actress, the artist use to take, it's usually material that are taken from the daily life, from the daily situations and the reality that they face. And it makes it directly an activist theatre that this is the need or the way or the skill for me, for example, as an actress also to use, this is the stage, this is the place for me. So this is the advantage also, this is also why I think the Palestinian theatre, it's always will be, I mean, this is an absurd, it's always what I wanted to say that it always will be a strong theatre because it's come from sufferer and occupation, but I hope it will not continue to be stuck in this field of subjects. So it's not easy, it's also because there is not a lot for a Palestinian actor. It's not easy also to work because you need to be a freelance, there is not enough theatres, not enough associations or places that can be a home for a Palestinian actors. And this is now also in this in this situation, like, like me and like a lot of friends that they are actors and actresses that it's a really hard time because that because it's, it's always, it always was hard for the theatre people now it's much, much harder because, because all of the situation but yeah, I wanted to say another thing that I forget now, but you can ask me more question and then I can answer you will come back. Yeah, so, so that in that sense, you don't have a city's theatres, so spaces that are run or supported by, by by the community by the city or whatever. So how, where are your spaces? Where do you, where do you create the work then in, in, in Palestine where the people who are coming to see your work? There is few places of course here but for example, the El Midan Theatre, they, that used to be the Palestinian National Theatre in Haifa that they closed because the Israeli government don't allow them to choose subjects and also they didn't give them the money that they deserve to work with it. And there is Khashbi Theatre in Haifa but also they have a space. So there is not a lot of places. How I work on my projects or personal projects usually we rent a spaces, which is sometimes it's hard to have this, this amount, but also sometimes at home. And then, for example, we, we go to, to a, to a health room for, for one week, but, but there is, there's not a lot of places. There is, there is the Israeli theatres and spaces that we can go there, but most of the time we decide not to, not to use these places as a form of our work as a Palestinian. We don't feel comfortable and it's not the right place. Not just, yeah. Also, I mean, I don't, I don't, this is, this is something that I decided before that I will work in my side and that is, it's up to, sometimes if you want to work with, it's up to, it's up to the subjects, but, but also I have my lines that I put it. We don't have a lot of institutions. Basically, there's except what Fidat just mentioned, there's, so there's, it basically Palestine is divided into two territories just to give a historical context. One is the West Bank and Gaza. The other is what we call the 48 territories, which are now internationally recognized as Israel. There is a 20% of these rallies are Palestinian minority. So this minority had a theater. So the Palestinians living with in what is today called Israel had one theater space. But it was shut down by the government. In the West Bank, there's two or three companies trying to create work and two or three spaces. But it's very sporadic and very, and basically very, very poor in funding. The funding comes mainly from private funds from Europe, and it's per project based. So, and then there's theater practitioners who become producers because there's no other option because that was my, my trajectory. I had something to say I wanted to say it I didn't have a place. So I created my own platform and my platform wasn't a theater. It was a rehearsal room that I rented repeatedly. My platform is a group of people that I want and like to work with. Luckily, these productions were quite successful and they toured internationally, allowing co productions, allowing other productions to happen. But it's literally down to one's efforts. There is no institutionalized, well funded. And in a way, with America being America, there's a lot of similarities with the arts in the States being so poorly funded as well. But there's still enough private funders and enough foundations and enough infrastructure to make it possible in America and in Palestine because of the unstable situation, politically, economically, on all levels unstable, unstable psychologically. It was always traditionally very hard to create the structures. It doesn't mean that we're not creating a lot of content. I think for our size, for our ability under the hard restraints that we endure, the amount of theater coming out is quite impressive. And the quality is like everywhere. There's great things and there's hard things. But that's true to every every theater community in the world that we're not unique there. But I think that what what makes the Palestinian seem very, very unique is the fact that it's we're unshatable. You know, that's the feeling that the the ethos that we all have as artists is that against all odds, defying reality, we will say what we want to say. Be it political or be it non political, it's not we're not just reduced to a conflict, I think we're we're part of a very ancient culture and tradition. And I want to celebrate all of that, not just my political brushing against another nation right now. In my work. And but it does feel that because our narrative is is hushed because our narrative is poorly represented because we are the underdogs in the conflict. We have another engine going towards not being silent and towards conquering big stages internationally, making our voices heard, advocating for our culture, not only our politics, but obviously also for politics. And actually telling our side of the story, not. That's me. I'm not talking in fedas name, but I'm not. But for me, it was never important to deny the other side story, I just want to be able to tell my story and then the public can have the platter of the narrative and of the human experience of this region and he'll go home and think or not. But I wanted to be able throughout my career to create theater in Arabic, which is my language. Explore my means of expression, my, my culture, and my political political situation deeply, profoundly not, you know, I think that one thing that the Palestinian theater can offer the world is a very, very, very well thought of political theater, because in a lot of places around the world, political theater is looked down on. It's like, it's newspapers. But I think because we've been doing political theater always because everything you do in Palestine is a political act, you can do a children's show about trees, it's a political act, it doesn't matter what you're doing, it's always a political act. I think that what we can share from our experiences is how political theater does not need to be reduced to political headlines. How political theater is, I always call it political poetical, how it could be profound, you know, for me Shakespeare was a political writer. Shakespeare wrote inside a political time of strife, a political time where the structures were heavy handed on the people, it wasn't, the world was unsafe. So when I read Shakespeare, I see the depth of his political thinking, not that I'm anywhere close to that depth, I'm not even presuming, but but I think that one thing that the Palestinian theater, not all of it, obviously, but one thing that the Palestinian theater has been experiencing a lot of is political theater that isn't reductive, political theater that is more complicated. Do you guys think that this corona time will influence the way you work? Will it be, will there be a change or do you feel it's a stop or do you feel are you rethinking fundamental philosophy of your work? For me, I always let her go first. Yes. Thank you. But that's because I listen and then I can make her good ideas. Yes. Like always, it's okay. I used it. Well, after after the corona, I guess, I guess, probably I'm waiting for this, I didn't think what will be different. Of course, the subjects like for now, yes, there is nothing I feel that it's relative or sorry, relevant. After the corona happened, like a lot of subjects for me, I feel like it's not really relevant to to work to work on it or to just to bring it. But what what I think it will be changed in my in my work. It just this feeling, this experience that I take from all this period to be to be in to be not involved. What does that mean social distance? How all this that you can start something that it will cut during the way all stops somehow. So this experience or this circle that had been cut cut in so I think I will take it with me. And one thing that it doesn't it doesn't up to the to the artistic process that I will be in but it's for us as an as Arab society, we use to the, you know, we are so close physically also. So now there is a distance social all everywhere, everywhere the distance social. So this is another thing that I will take or also to my maybe to my work. So this this details it will be affected my work, the new stuff, the new, the new habits that people that people get used to. And the last thing that I think about it is the mask. So to wear the mask. I think I just discover a way to be undercover and not to for me as a woman sometimes it feels it feels good just to cover and to be like not known. This is the this is absolute but sometimes it feels it feels safe. But also that you can be so often also in the street and do whatever you want from back to this mask and nobody will notice or will see it. So this high to be hide this small stuff because absolutely I think we start to forget all we almost like I today I went to buy some stuff. People was there without masks without a just just they are moving. So yes, I'm just waiting to to to all all of this situation will end and then we will be in theater again with an audience I missed the audience. That's it for me, you know, there's two there's two conflicting things in me. One is, because I've been through a couple of rounds of conflict, you know that you shouldn't react too soon. When it's raining, it's raining and you don't start talking about the weather. And I think right now we're still in Corona mode. It's early for me to understand what's this means in the long term. But again, because I grew up where I grew up, I know that we are very flexible and we stretch and then we go back into our normality very fast. I think that's one of the things that for us is quite quite obvious in a way that once this plague is over, life will fight to become normal again, because we saw it happen time after time after time. The world has been plagued before attacked before devastation happened before life wants to become normal again. So I think the change is going to be in the long term. The changes are going to be smaller than what we predict when we're sitting alone in a room not seeing anyone for six weeks, or a month or two or three, you know, I think our tendency is to forget, not forget forget but to recover from trauma very fast and seek life we want to live. And I think that will happen in New York and will happen in London and when it happens it will kick on with more urgency. Now that the mask of the Western civilization safety has been partially removed, I think our need to regain normality will be faster than we then we expect right now. I'm pretty sure that will happen. Just because I've been in normal that becomes unnormal and then strives to become normal again. I know we'll have an onslaught of shows about Corona and about isolation in place. Right now I don't feel I have anything to say about that. It's too close. Maybe when this is all over and I learned something new, but you you don't talk about the bullets while they whistle. For me, that's me. Some artists can, I can't. That's my shortcoming. The main thoughts are about what does it mean to be together and what what forms is together. Is this together when we're separated with a huge ocean and time zones and glass screens between us? Are we together right now? Are we breathing the same air? Are we sharing the same moment? Yes and no. Is this theater? I don't know. I'm still I'm not I don't know because every time I watched a live streaming of the NT it felt this is in theater and their gorgeous production. Some of them I saw live and was moved to my core. But when you see them with a screen and you're not surrounded by the warmth and stench of people, they don't they're not theater for me. And they're beautifully done. Can we create content that way and call it theater? Is theater a bunch of five people with social distancing listening to a story? When do we become a pack? And for me, theater exists when we are a pack a pack of two or pack of three. It doesn't matter. But when we have a group intimacy, because theater for me is an intimate act. And so yeah, these structures are where I'm thinking. Is it right that we actually don't need the big theaters and the can we do theaters in our living rooms in small groups where it feels safer as as a as a passage. I'm sure we'll go back to the flashing lights of Broadway and the big venues and we'll all enjoy being surrounded by thousands of people or hundreds of people sharing a story together, which is what's gorgeous about theater. What are the options up until then? Not storytelling because storytelling, you know, Netflix, they do a brilliant job. Our best friend right now is streaming TV streaming services. But when does theater exist? I think corona made these questions more acute. When does theater really begin to happen? There, we often talk about that new times, you know, demand new forms of theater, as Bright said, and did you find something in your political theater, what you already practiced? Do you find some something we say, yes, that can work, you know, this is something how do you do it? And how does it work? And could that be of inspiration to, you know, our audiences, people who are listening in from around the world, and we often have over 30 countries. So is there something what you found as a work, what would you say? Think about this when you go back? Your experience? You know, what I found in my work repeatedly. And that's partly what I'm trying to say is what what I can say about my work in the new reality is that theaters might be shut. The economics of the arts might be flushed down the toilet for the next. But if you have something to say, find a way to say it, find the way to create the conditions where you gather five people in a corner of the streets. If you have something that is deep and important for you, that's theater. That's why I keep on saying these big structures will come back, it might take them time. But in the meantime, if we have something to say, we'll need to find the cracks in the rock. So we can express ourselves. Now, in Palestine, the rock is the reality. So we are used to finding cracks. And the cracks can be anything we did shows in repair in car repair shops and in open fields. We did shows where there's nothing except a bunch of people. And we did shows where there is a big venue and you know, and you have all the and the core if what you're trying to say is honest. It's theater. So if there's one thing I can say is don't rely on the big structures and the funding and in order to go, I need to kick back in, you can kick back in now, maybe via Zoom in the beginning, but maybe once the situation, once there's a crack in the bleakness, have dinner and turn that dinner. While you know, while you're safe, turn that theater that small intimate dinner with people that you can meet that you're allowed to meet into a theatrical performance. It's not about the numbers. And yeah, living is going to be hard. Living off art is going to be hard. But it's but wasn't it always hard? When wasn't it hard? I think we're like water. I really think we are like water and we we find the cracks. And yeah, a lot of people that were in it now because it was glitchy and beautiful and kind of fun. And they will become psychologists. There's something about the gorilla approach that Palestine Palestinian theater has been living in, which I think more and more places will start to adapt and adopt will start thinking differently. Because what happens when you need to do social distancing in a venue and then it's not enough to cover the venue, get rid of the venue. Don't get rid of the production. Just chuck the venue to the garbage. Do it in a parking lot. Do it in a park, do it wherever you can. If you have a production that you want to do do it do it radically. And for us living this radical situation as our foundation, all I can say is join the party guys. It's fun doing things like that with no stage management and no big lighting crew and you know, it's a party. And the art does not need to suffer. It just needs honesty. And if it's honest, it's honest. Now now that's what I can share from my under duress. No, this is a significant and advice and and a reality for you guys from many others, but for many who Susan Sontag's one said, don't wait till society kisses you on the forehead and says, yes, you can do something. You say no, I do do your work as complex and complicated. But it has always been hard for artists over centuries. But as we say, they have been on the right side of social justice on the right side of history. If you had listened to artists early on, whether it was in South Africa, where we had a talk or in Poland or Hungary early on, you would know what's right and what's wrong. And societies would have avoided many, many hardships and wars. And it's significant what you both say what you do. Your work is important to be all everybody in the world, of course, also watches like in every country. And what our fellow artists and collaborators do and your work is significant and important. Maybe a close since we're coming closer to an end. Is there something what you would dream of? And let's say for Palestinian theater, I'm saying this is even so you say we don't need anything. But of course, it's hard. But is there something what you would dream of? We say this would make our life really different, what would be an ideal or a vision of a Palestinian state? Have we said, I wish this could happen? For that? Now you go. I need to think. I, you know, I wish we have boredom, Swiss kind of Swiss kind boredom. That would be great. Of course, this is to do with political with a political reality. But I think once our theater has boredom, deep rooted boredom, we will move to a different reality. But until the situation changes completely, and I don't, I'm not, I'm an optimist when it comes to theater, I'm a complete pessimist when it comes to politics. I don't see that happening in my lifetime. The one thing I can, inside the current political situation, I see if there's one thing I can wish for ourselves is not to stop and not to become lazy mentally, to keep on questioning our reality, be it Corona or be it occupation, they're very different, but there's some similarities. And to be relentless, to stay relentless, to not kind of not give up, not get, not get oppressed. I think that's the, because that is what oppression is. Oppression is the mechanism where you become oppressed. I, I, I deny that I won't give that to the political reality. There's a checkpoint, there's a checkpoint. It's fine. You have traffic. There's a wall, there's a wall. Okay, I'll walk around it. But I won't let the political situation define me, reduce me, tell me who I am and how I should think. And that's something I, I, I hope that as long as the political situation is what it is, we continue doing what I really want is that the political situation changes. And we have a fair society that is multicultural. And that they take the money they invest in combat and war and pour it into theaters and museums and galleries, I think will be a better society. Israelis and Palestinians. Right now, we're far from that. Alas. Yeah, what I want to add also, for what Nizar just said, it's, I want to, I want to wish to the Palestinian actress and actors to cut this and doing and create, because this is our also our resistance, we are creating art. So this is one way of our resistance also to be to be here. It's like, we prove in this way that we are working instead of the, of all of the political situation. And what happens now during the corona. And one more thing I will wish also we are working on this as a there is Palestinian places, colleges that they are study theater in in a different level, not just colleges, but this is one thing that I also wish that we will have more and more courses in university about theater about Palestinian theater. And to have more work about our search or writing about our theater, because this is what makes us spread to other countries and they bring more awareness to our theater and space and place also. Yeah, this is an important suggestions, you know, that universities always have played a role education. And but also to have theater as a way of life that artists are speaking and artists is a provocation to do your own work to say this is what I do. And this is what art and especially theater has done in societies that it works through crisis symbolically in a real way, but also with imagination and imagining a different, different possibilities. It's a significant contribution you guys make to the place where you are to Palestine, the Arab world and Israeli and the planet in itself. So this is we are on your side. We are my curious what you do. We hope with Alex and Bonnie that the tonight touring will will will continue that the world perhaps comes one day to a theater festival and and that out of this crisis also something will emerge that values perhaps more than before the contribution artists like you make. It's about also survival. I hope you will get the help from your community. You supported your community. I hope it will also give back and get you through that time also in New York and in so many places, eight, nine months that everything has been canceled musicians out of work, dancers, theater people, freelance people, it's disastrous. And it just shows the current system is not working. There has to be changed and has to be real change. And we have to fight for it, work for it and also prepare. It sounds like things are already get back to normal. You say people are without mask and they forgot about it. We of course are still in the middle of it. And tomorrow we speak to artists from Brazil, Roberto Estela Dalva and Deanne Carlos and just today with the news how staggering high numbers are hitting Brazil unprecedented within the day. I think close to a thousand was probably under reported still. But for 500 that are known off. And so that Corona train arrives in different schedules around the world, which of course will make it so complicated for big cities like New York, where the entire world comes to and from and to really have perhaps what you have in Palestine where it is confined more in small places like perhaps Singapore or also Taiwan, you know, in South Korea where things are going better. But it will be interesting to hear from our fellow artists in Brazil is a very complicated situation, very complicated political situation at the moment. And the arts also have been suffering. On Friday, we hear Edward Luis Elvis Burma and Hermine Yellow from Cameroon, they will talk about what is happening in Africa with Corona, but also for them as a work as an artist. So thank you guys for sharing for being part of these world voices. And it is important for us to know what you go through. And we think about you, you're not alone. And we care for what you do. And you obviously care so much also about your country, your friends, your people and your region. And also, I wish everybody would see the world as theater artists do. And I think it would be a better place. Thank you all for tuning in. Thanks for hall round here. And Vijay for supporting us. Travis did a great job yesterday was a translation conference. We started on help. Penn had the very first translation conference a global one 50 years ago. And it was a conference supposed to happen. It did not happen. And of course, because of the Corona, but now every week on Tuesdays on how around there will be translators of novels, plays, poems, we'll talk to each other. I think it is a sign that the world has developing a global conscience and our talks and these talks and others are significant. So tune in. Thank you all again for listening. Also the Segal team, Sanyang and Andy Chaki to be with us. And I hope to our audience, you will join us again. Thank you for taking the time. We know how busy your days are, your lives are how many zoom talks calls visits are out there. And so it means a lot to have you listening. But it is important also for these artists like today, that there is an audience that listens and care. So it means a lot to us. And we have a great audience and into some of them over 30 countries listening for the media row talk over 5,000 listeners. It's extraordinary. What these times produced. So thank you. And hope you will tune in again, stay safe and see you all and hope in New York one day and I think I'll be back to it normal that is not the normal how it was, but it will be a new way of doing things to finding forms that actually do work. And so thank you all.