Late British actor Laurence Olivier once said: “I believe that in a great city, or even in a small city or a village, a great theatre is the outward and visible sign of an inward and probable culture.” A handful of theatre companies managed to keep the theatre alive during the past few years of hardship in Lebanon. In this article, I highlight the role of Homemade Theatre in keeping theatre venues open, and I shed light on the value of playwrights for the emergence of a genuine local culture.
Car Accident (1995); The Staircase (2004); The Bride (2006); Letters From My Aunt (2011); Elephants’ Cemetery (2016); Moon Ropes (2019); A Necklace, a Ring, and a Bracelet (2020); these are only a few titles written by the Lebanese playwright Dimitri Melki. Dimitri has been writing theatre plays in the Lebanese dialect, formal Arabic, and French since the 1980s. He is also an actor, teacher, and archivist. I first met Dimitri as a passionate film history teacher before we became friends. Helped by his exceptionally sharp memory, his vast knowledge of local, regional and international film and theatre scenes is unmatchable. Sometimes, I feel I am in the company of a human encyclopaedia. In a country like Lebanon, where support for artists is inexistent, Dimitri’s talents and expertise feel, at times, like a burden rather than a gift. Choosing to be a professional writer in the Arab region is arduous, so imagine how hard is the journey of a playwright. To playwrights, publishing is one way to reach their audience, but it is not the most satisfactory route. A playwright wants to see his plays on stage since the stage is the ultimate destination of a play script. Published in 1986, Narcisse, was Dimitri’s most known piece that has been staged several times in Lebanon during the last two decades. That is until he met Chadi El Haber, a stage director and the founder of Homemade Theatre, an alternative training space for aspiring amateur and professional actors and stage directors. Since that meeting, Dimitri’s plays began to be regularly staged. Chadi had finally found in Dimitri’s work the gold mine of Lebanese scripts he has been seeking for a long time.
The story of Homemade Theatre started in 2016 when Chadi decided to turn a flat in an old traditional building in Beirut into a cosy home for theatre lovers. The location is a little gem; squeezed between the Adlieh Highway and Furn El Chebbak busy street, the neighbourhood where the home is located looks like a forgotten little village in the city. Entering the alley in the evening is a magical experience in itself. The flat is, indeed, a home, an intimate private space running actors’ training and workshops throughout the week. Chadi managed brilliantly to make the space self-sufficient and financially sustainable by building a model where the community supports itself.
The training at Homemade Theatre runs in cycles of nine months leading participants to present a theatrical performance at an established theatre in the city. After the initial nine-months training, successful students who wish to continue pursuing their passion can enrol in a training cycle for professionals. In addition, sporadic workshops are offered to the general public, usually during the weekend. Within the last six years, 18 groups have graduated from the space, and Homemade Theatre staged 28 theatre plays divided between students’ work and professional performance.
Of the 28 plays, five plays are written by Dimitri Melki: Narcisse, Stairs, Traveling Corpse, Scarf, and Lamiaa’s Notebooks. All were staged with a professional cast and crew. Travelling Corpse starred Dimitri Melki marking his return to the stage as an actor after a long period of absence.
The collaboration between Chadi El Haber and Dimitri Melki is remarkable and has rarely been achieved in the history of theatre in Lebanon. In Dimitri’s view, collaborations between directors and playwrights are supposed to function this way; at least, this is how it works in Europe where theatre directors actively read and seek out scripts that speak to their visions. When the script is found, the director contacts the writer to discuss potential collaborations. Yet, I think what is remarkable about their continued collaborations is the high level of artistic visions alignment between the two. Such an alignment is infrequent, even in more theatre-experienced countries. I assume concessions from both sides are at play in these collaborations, but the results seem satisfactory to both parties.
Dimitri’s collaboration with Homemade Theatre isn’t confined to the stage; over the past few years, he became a regular lecturer in the space. He gives workshops in playwriting open to the space’s students and the general public and lectures on the history of theatre for regular students. “The passion of Homemade Theatre’s team and students for theatre and theatre-making reminds me of my earliest engagement with theatre. I could spend my 24 hours at the theatre and so do they. This level of love and engagement with theatre had become so rare these days and this reflects on the quality of the produced work,” Dimitri explains.
Chadi and Dimitri are preparing to stage three new plays in 2023: The Departure of Butterflies scheduled to stage end of February, and beginning of March; At Forty scheduled for May; and Queen of Spades planned to stage next Autumn. The casting for the three plays has been concluded and agreed upon between the director and the playwright, and rehearsals have begun for the first play in line.
It is indeed heart-warming to witness passionate people at work, more so in a country like Lebanon where passions have been tamed down not to say suffocated by a dysfunctional and abusive political system. Besides theatre being a great art form, it is a therapeutic practice that heals practitioners and audiences alike. I hope these sparks of bright lights will always shine on us all to warm our hearts and souls and bring the city back to life stronger and livelier.
By: Jana Al Obeidyine, a dancer, writer and independent publisher based in Beirut- Lebanon.
Copyright Photos: Dimitri Melki