Written by Jackie Lubeck
Directred by Mohammed Al-Hissi and Paul  Knieriem

For these Summer Games of 2011, Jackie Lubeck has written a collection of four plays with the cover title “Entanglement.” The plays were written in the spirit of Gaza during the year where much of the population was concerned, also confused, about the future, of their work, their movement, and about the overall political situation. This was the starting point.

As a result, the four plays that were written looked at different groups within the population and how they got through a given day. In “The Grandfathers” we meet the oldest of our population, those men between 90-105 who still have something to say and who know the country from top to bottom. In “The Mothers” we find a group of all ages of women, from the pregnant new wife to the older woman whose 12 children have left the country. In “The Brothers” we hear from the male teenagers who are ready to fight anything, including each other, these boys who are the warriors at this age, regardless of the subject. And then in “The Sisters” we watch the youngest and most vulnerable ot the population and that is the little girls. The relations between these 16 people are the secret of the writer and provide a game for the many kids who saw more than one play and who tried to match up the families.

“The Brothers”

The brothers make a circus. Six boys are looking for a place where they can play. There are too many kids and not enough playgrounds so gangs of boys are fighting over who can play where and when. Where they can act like kids, where they can relax and where they feel at ease. Violence is often the means but is never the solution. Should they play together?

As the circus, they can travel to the schools to perform their tricks. On this day, everything goes wrong. One of the boys can’t do his tricks anymore. The audience is expecting a circus performance. In the heat of the moment, they decide to tell the audience how they became a circus group, how they used to be normal. They used to meet at a swimming pool and fight over who went in and who not. Every day it was the same story until this routine of fighting because funny. The continued swimming and fighting until they had a circus routine that became the greatest show on earth… until they started fighting again…!

Group 1
Ihab – Mohammed Owaida
Titi – Mohammed Al-Saftawi
Mazen – Mohammed Othman
Sirhan – Ayman Othman
Monster 1 – Tarek Ghabayen
Monster 2 – Mahmoud Abu Mustafa

Supervisor – Thaer Abu Qamar
Technician – Ibrahim Nashwan
Loading – Saadi Radwan

Group 2
Ihab – Ahmed Al-Banna
Titi – Ashraf Al-Afifi
Mazen – Yousif Nofel
Sirhan – Fouad Zaqout
Monster 1 – Abd Al-Majeed Shihada
Monster 2 – Alaa Al-Nabrees

Supervisor – Mohammed Humaida
Technician – Abdullah Al-Maghari
Loading – Fadel Zayed

Group 3
Ihab – Mahmoud Abu Zbeida
Titi – Muhannad Abu Khadra
Mazen – Mohammed Al-Hajj
Sirhan – Ahmed Awad
Monster 1 – Fawzi Abu Zanad
Monster 2 – Younis Ghattass

Supervisor – Mohammed Al-Hissi
Technician – Mahmoud Sukar
Loading – Mohammed Al-Banna

Overall Artistic Supervision
Jan Willems, Rafat Al Aydeh, Liesbeth Coltof, Dennis Meyer

Educational Program
Mohammed Al-Hissi & Paul  Knieriem
Rosa Fontein & Lotte Kanters

Voice Training
Bart Kiene

Movement Advice
Hassan Ben Gharbia

Design and Technical Team
Riyad Al Akhras
Ashraf Sirhan
Ahmad Qadada
Mohammed Nofel
Ola Salem
Wessam Al-Dirawi
Ward Nassrallah

Administration
Randa Muhanna
Amal Abu Dawoud
Maryam Enaia
Kamal Shoublaq
Rawia Mushtaha
Hadeel Sous
Francis Tams
&
UNRWA