Noor: October 16, 8:00 PM

PREVIEW

Noor: October 16, 8:00 PM

Date: Tue, Oct 16, 2018 08:00PM
Price: $25, $22.50 Friends

Please be advised:
Upon entry to the yurt, we ask that you remove your shoes
Seating is on floor-cushions and stools
The play contains mature subject matter
No latecomers will be admitted

Noor is a play, concert, performance experiment, and live installation, which follows a family living in Toronto in 2018. Noor, a young woman embarking on adulthood, faces the absence of her mother, and looks for shelter in a relationship with another young woman. Noor’s father struggles to establish a relationship with his daughter. As each character struggles internally with identity, faith, belonging, and displacement, they look to Rumi and the untraceable path of his muse Shams Tabriz. 

The Rumi and Shams historical narrative, which, in part, inspired the character of Noor’s mother, raises the fear of debilitating loss. For Rumi, dealing with the devastation of Shams’ mysterious disappearance, poetry was essential. Noor’s coming of age, involves facing that same fear – and both align under the banner of this season’s Performing Arts theme The Other Side of Fear.

Generous Friend, a Toronto collective of performing artists, will be in residence, rehearsing and performing Noor in a Mongolian yurt located in the courtyard of the Museum. Performances will feature recitations (spoken and sung) of Rumi and Pakistani poet Parveen Shakir.

A group of interdisciplinary artists will be performing this new work written by Erum Khan, directed by Erin Brubacher, with original music by the electronic music duo LAL and sitarist Anwar Khurshid. Through performance projects, Generous Friend seeks to create worlds that reflect the current and fluid social, political, and cultural landscape in Canada.

From October 2–11, Museum visitors are invited to experience open rehearsals and witness performance-making in process. When the artists are not working in the yurt, there will be traces of the work-in-progress and related programming.

After the two-week-long open rehearsal, there will be nine full-length ticketed performances from October 13–21.


Bios:

Erum Khan is a film- and theatre-maker. Current and recent projects include: Creator and performer for Becoming (Rhubarb Festival and Ottawa Fringe Festival, 2018); assistant director for Acha Bacha (Theatre Passe Muraille); production assistant and collaborator for 7th Cousins performer and assistant director for Concord Floral (The Theatre Centre, Canadian Stage, and The PuSh International Performance Festival); and filmmaker for Banjaare ka ghar (Toronto Independent Film Festival, 2016). She was part of the 2017/18 Emerging Creators Unit at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre and is currently the Youth Coordinator for the Rendezvous With Madness Film Festival.

Erin Brubacher is a director and multidisciplinary artist. Her work has been presented by The National Arts Centre, Canadian Stage, Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, Nightwood Theatre, The PuSh International Performance Festival, and others. Recent directing projects include the award-winning productions of Concord Floral and Kiinalik: These Sharp Tools for which she was awarded Best Director by the Toronto Theatre Critics in 2018.

Anwar Khurshid is a JUNO-nominated sitarist and composer. He collaborates across genres including blues with Paul Deslauriers, jazz with Bruce Cassidy, flamenco and Cuban jazz with Sultans of String, and African music with Waleed Kush. Khurshid has composed music for films including Life of Pi, Love Guru, and Kama Sutra: A Tale of Love.

Nicholas ‘murr’ Murray is a composer and producer of electronic music, and a sound designer for theatre and film. Born in Barbados, he is a founding member of the music production company Da Grassroots and of the Toronto band LAL for which he has produced two records, Corners and Warm Belly, High Power.

Rosina Kazi is the lead singer of the radical electronic music duo LAL. Kazi has been instrumental in the growth of many of the city’s QT/BIPOC artists, providing venues and forums for their musical expression in the underground electronic music scene. She grew up in the Bangladeshi community where politics and art went hand in hand, and political awareness is a distinctive feature of her music. Kazi and murr (LAL) have been running independent shows, workshops, and gatherings out of their home/studio space, unit 2, for 10 years.

Sofía Rodríguez was born and raised in the City of Mountains: Monterrey, Mexico. A graduate of Randolph College and one of 2017’s Emerging Creator at Buddies in Bad Times. She is a multidisciplinary actor, creator, and collaborator currently based in Toronto. Her recent work includes: Shadow Girls (Pencil Kit Productions), Communist Manifesto For Children (Rhubarb Festival), El Retorno/I Return (Theatre Aquarius, Riser Project), Nasty (Feminist Fuck It, Fringe), PETS (Changeup, Shadowland Theatre), Anato/mía (Rhubarb Festival), a stage reading of the musical In The Heights (We Are Here), and the short films The Morning After, Love You to Death, and Diferente (Inside Out Festival). 

Cast and Crew
Erin Brubacher (director); Kaitlin Hickey (set design); Rosina Kazi (original music; performer); Erum Khan (writer; performer); James Kendal (production management); Anwar Khurshid (original music; performer); Jennifer Lee (stage management); Davinder Malhi (marketing assistance); Tijiki Morris (assistant direction); Nicholas Murray (sound design, original music); Franco Pang (production/design assistance); Liz Peterson (artistic collaboration); Rebecca Picherack (lighting design); Sofía Rodríguez (performer)

RELATED PROGRAMMING

PERFORMANCE SERIES
NOOR

Live rehearsals: October 2-6; October 9-11
Previews: October 13, 16
Performances: October 16-18; October 20-21

PREVIEW
NOOR: OCTOBER 16,
2:00 PM

Tuesday, October 16, 2:00 PM




Noor is part of the National Arts Centre's The Collaborations, and has been supported by: Nightswimming Theatre, Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, the Toronto Arts Council, the Ontario Arts Council, the Canada Council for the Arts.


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