At the risk of stating the horribly obvious, recent events in the Middle East have given a grim new topicality to the Almeida’s adaptation of Babak Anvari’s 2016 horror film about a mother and daughter menaced by supernatural forces in wartorn 1980s Tehran.
Then again, Nadia Latif’s production aspires to timelessness. While it tells an Iranian story with a cast of Iranian origin, the fact Carmen Nasr’s script is in English obviously puts a different spin on things than the Persian-language film. As does Ben Stones’ living room set, a tasteful middle class home that transcends obvious place, and even time: bar the tiny old style telly, there’s no tell that this is the ’80s.
And its timelessness gives it power, a dark universal parable about living under two shadows: war, and a totalitarian state.
Leila Farzad’s Shideh is a frustrated wife, whose dream of becoming a doctor has foundered due to her blacklisting for leftwing activities during the Iranian Revolution. Now she stews at home with her daughter Dorsa, as enthusiastic about being a housewife as a tiger is about being caged.
And then there’s the war. Tehran is being bombed, and there’s talk of missiles soon too. But could there be something worse? Allegedly mute neighbourhood boy Mehdi has apparently whispered to Dorsa that vengeful djinn are abroad. When their building is hit by a missile, it seems like something has come in with it.
The djinn are a very good metaphor for the horror that intrudes on civilian life during wartime, and perhaps also for the malign tendrils of an oppressive state that won’t allow Shideh to live her life.
I don’t think this production works nearly as well as an actual supernatural horror as the film, though. Part of it is simply a case of length: the play is an hour longer than the film but doesn’t contain a higher volume of spooky stuff, so when it does happen it feels almost more like an addendum than actively integral.
Moreover, the means by which the djinn manifest in the film has seemingly backed Latif into a corner, wherein she has to show a monster that isn’t particularly scary in a theatrical context. And in a vintage year for horror on stage, Latif’s technologically sophisticated production nonetheless falls short of the likes of Paranormal Activity and A Ghost in Your Ear. Although I think there is some ambiguity over whether or not Shideh is simply having a breakdown, I wonder if the djinn might have been scarier if implicit rather than explicit. Farzad is very watchable as the plummy heroine – she reminded me a bit of an angry, haunted Nigella – although I wonder if a few more fireworks as she disintegrates might have given the production the edge it never quite achieves.
Still, as a drama about living under the strain of war and government oppression, it absolutely works. And special praise for press night child actor Erin Jemmotte, who did a terrific job with a substantial role as the whiny-slash-unearthly Dorsa. In some ways the most audacious thing about this show is having such a large part for a tween - I’m sure the other two actors who alternate the role are great too, but Jemmotte really smashes it.
