{"id":40379,"date":"2023-01-13T01:57:58","date_gmt":"2023-01-13T09:57:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/?p=40379"},"modified":"2023-01-11T14:57:07","modified_gmt":"2023-01-11T22:57:07","slug":"controversy-welcome","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/2023\/01\/13\/controversy-welcome\/","title":{"rendered":"Controversy welcome"},"content":{"rendered":"

Soldiers of Tomorrow, about Itai Erdal\u2019s experiences in the Israeli army, is at the Roundhouse Feb. 3-5.\u00a0<\/em>(photo from the Elbow Theatre)<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI know that this play will piss off a lot of people on both sides of the conflict, but I welcome the controversy. I am taking some strong stances and talking about some explosive subject matters (pun intended) so, if it wasn\u2019t going to piss people off, then I probably didn\u2019t do my job properly,\u201d Itai Erdal told the Independent<\/em>. \u201cI think it\u2019s good to challenge people and I welcome the discussion that this play will generate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Erdal was talking about Soldiers of Tomorrow<\/em>, which he wrote with Colleen Murphy. The play is part of this year\u2019s PuSh International Performing Arts Festival, and sees its world premi\u00e8re Feb. 3-5 at Roundhouse Performance Centre.<\/p>\n

Presented by the Elbow Theatre and PuSh, Soldiers of Tomorrow<\/em> is directed by Anita Rochon and performed by Erdal with Syrian musician Emad Armoush.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I was a kid growing up in Israel, peace seemed inevitable \u2013 it was just a matter of time, there were countless songs about the day peace will arrive. The adults would always say, \u2018By the time you grow up, we won\u2019t need an army anymore.\u2019 No one says that today,\u201d writes Erdal on his website. \u201cMost Israelis accept that their children will be soldiers. One day, when my nephew was 8, he came home from school with an empty box to fill with stuff to send to soldiers on the front line. Inside the box his teacher had written: \u2018To the soldiers of today from the soldiers of tomorrow.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

This experience inspired the play. While fictional, it is about real events that happened to Erdal during his time in the Israel Defence Forces in the early 1990s.<\/p>\n

\u201cI served in the army for three years and as a combatant soldier,\u201d said Erdal. \u201cI would have had to be in the reserves until the age of 45, which I didn\u2019t want to do. I was in Jerusalem during all the suicide bombings in the \u201990s and my reluctance to continue to be a soldier and my exhaustion of the political situation definitely contributed to my decision to immigrate to Vancouver.\u201d<\/p>\n

Erdal has made his mark here in many ways, including as an award-winning playwright, performer and lighting designer. He created the Elbow Theatre in 2012 \u201cto confront urgent social and political issues.\u201d Soldiers of Tomorrow<\/em> is its sixth production. The PR blurb notes that, in it, Erdal \u201crelates his actions in the army, exploring his personal culpability in the face of complex geopolitical forces in his former country \u2013 a place that he loves \u2018with a broken heart.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI pitched the idea for this play to Colleen Murphy in 2018 when we were working together in Stratford,\u201d Erdal told the Independent<\/em>. \u201cWe met a few times that year, but it really took off when the pandemic started. For almost two years, Colleen and I would meet on Zoom every Monday and Thursday for two hours. It was really great to have a project during the lockdown, it kept me sane.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although it is a one-man play, Armoush will also be on stage with Erdal, performing the music live. As to how he connected with Armoush, Erdal said, \u201cI was looking for a Palestinian musician but there aren\u2019t many of them in Vancouver and Emad was highly recommended by my Israeli musician friends.\u201d<\/p>\n

About the timing, Erdal explained, \u201cDuring my lifetime, the situation for Palestinians has only gotten worse, it never gets better. Israel recently formed the most extreme right-wing government in its history, with several openly racist and homophobic ministers. Many Israelis and Palestinians are bracing themselves for the worst. Unfortunately, this play is more relevant than ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

He is not concerned about how Jews in general or Israelis specifically will be perceived by non-Jewish people who see the play.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am a very proud Jew and, even though I criticize the state of Israel, I do so because I love it, and I think that love is clear in the play,\u201d said Erdal, who shared the following quote from the play: \u201cI am aware that this is a topic that intimidates many Canadians. I\u2019ve seen the glazed look in your eyes. I\u2019ve had many people ask me to explain the conflict to them and, after one minute, they are searching for the exit. I\u2019ve also seen many people twist themselves into pretzels in order not to take sides because they were concerned about appearing antisemitic. I hope by the time you leave here, you\u2019ll be able to criticize Israel without worrying about appearing antisemitic.\u201d<\/p>\n

Soldiers of Tomorrow<\/em> is at the Roundhouse Feb. 3-4, 7:30 p.m., and Feb. 5, 2 p.m., with a post-show talkback after the Feb. 4 performance. The show is 75 minutes long, with no intermission. Tickets ($34) can be purchased at pushfestival.ca<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The PuSh International Performing Arts Festival runs Jan. 19-Feb. 5. It features 20 original works \u2013 theatre, dance, music, multimedia and circus \u2013 from 12 countries and includes six world premi\u00e8res, one North American debut, six Canadian and two Western Canadian openings and one Vancouver premi\u00e8re. Single tickets start at $34 in-person, $25 online, plus there are pay-what-you-can and free events; passes, which offer a discount and other perks, are available for both in-person and digital shows. Visit\u00a0pushfestival.ca<\/a>\u00a0or call 604-449-6000.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Soldiers of Tomorrow, about Itai Erdal\u2019s experiences in the Israeli army, is at the Roundhouse Feb. 3-5.\u00a0(photo from the Elbow Theatre) \u201cI know that this play will piss off a lot of people on both sides of the conflict, but I welcome the controversy. I am taking some strong stances and talking about some explosive […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":40381,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[785],"tags":[22046,1739,1168,5349,22042,20191,6208],"class_list":["post-40379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-performing-arts","tag-elbow-theatre","tag-idf","tag-israel-defence-forces","tag-itai-erdal","tag-memoirs","tag-push-festival","tag-theatre"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40379\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}