An excellent springboard into a library of texts which UK teachers may otherwise never discover
Performing International Plays is a not-for-profit, open access website, designed ‘to empower and support teachers in their effort to diversify the curriculum and make sure the content they deliver speaks to and represents all students in our diverse classrooms.’
The site includes 20 plays from 5 continents written in 15 languages by authors from diverse backgrounds published in English translation, which ‘can easily be incorporated into curricular and extracurricular Drama at secondary school or college level.’
Each play is accompanied by a variety of resources; five (A Fable for Now, Fireworks, I See You, The Concert and The Grain Store) come with filmed excerpts featuring professional actors performing the plays in their original language, in the published English translations, and in brand new adaptations set in different contexts. It's easy to see how these resources might inspire teachers and students to understand how the works might be adapted – culturally, linguistically, and in other ways.
All the plays come with free education packs exploring key themes and ideas, incorporating a synopsis, key scene breakdowns, and exercises to use in the classroom. Some are also accompanied by in-depth essays.
Practically speaking, the plays are supposed to be filterable by the number of characters in them, and the country from which they hail – this will be a useful feature when it is in place.
I took a close look at Fireworks by Dalia Taha, translated by Clem Naylor. Originally written in Palestinian Arabic, this is a 6-hander recommended for students aged 12+ which explores how war fractures childhood, by focussing on a family living under bombing in a Palestinian town. I was able to watch clips of the same scene performed in both Palestian and in English, and then to see an adapted version in English which completely transposes the setting to Northern Ireland during the Covid-19 lockdown.
Adaptor Hannah Khalili's explanation for this transposition is very interesting, showing how cultural links can be made in the study of a foreign-language or foreign-set text: ‘At the start of the Covid-19 lockdown, I kept reminding myself that however difficult it was for me, in London, it would be much tougher for Palestinians living under occupation. I wondered hopefully whether a greater empathy with the Palestinian people might be achieved by us in the West, having had a tiny taste of confinement and restriction…’
In a cast and creatives interview video, the director of these extracts, Omar Elerian, says ‘I hope when students will watch this, if by any chance they have one of these languages as part of their cultural heritage at home, they will feel more included, and they will feel like that language is not just something that sits outside in the private sphere but is part of a more global culture.’
Whether or not you have a multicultural classroom, it is well worth exploring this site for ideas, and as a resource it is very worthy of its shortlisting in the 2022 Music & Drama Education Awards.