White Rabbit, Red Rabbit hops into Vancouver

By Tabitha Swanson
[contributor]

If you’ve been looking for a unique and inspiring art experience in Vancouver, the play White Rabbit, Red Rabbit is sure to impress. Written by Nassim Soleimanpour, White Rabbit, Red Rabbit has been shown in Brazil, London, Scotland, and Sao Jose do Rio Preto.

This time around, Nassim’s work will be playing in Vancouver from Sept. 19 to Sept. 30 at The Cultch and will feature all Canadian actors and actresses, with almost all of them being from Vancouver. Each night, it features an actor or actress who has never before seen the script. The loose summary explains the story of a 29 year old, who is unable to leave his country. The actors are given an envelope just before they go on set and have to act on total improvisation. This style of acting is a breath of fresh air. There are no prior practices for the actors to fall back to, which makes everything raw and real.

The Runner asked Nassim what inspired him to write a play in this unusual manner, and if he thought it helped the performance. He said that “questions about our borders of obedience is the key to write such a play. Plus it was/is a good opportunity to investigate new aspects of my theatre”.

The actors participating in White Rabbit, Red Rabbit are all seasoned professionals. The opening night actress, Carmen Aguirre (Sept 19), is a writer herself and has written and co-written over 20 plays and acted in more than 60 pieces. She is also the author of the book “Something Fierce” about the revolution during the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile.

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Marcus Youssef, one of the actors in the play, spoke to The Runner about his feelings leading up to the show as well as what this role, and acting in general, means to him.

The Runner: “Are you nervous about acting in White Rabbit, Red Rabbit, as you won’t see the script until just before the show??

Marcus Youssef: “I am a bit nervous, but also excited. I love this kind of show, where whatever I’m going through experiencing will be completely transparent to the audience. And my job is to be as present as possible in the circumstance of not knowing what will happen next. This is something live performance does very well. I did a show with a similar kind of step-up at the Push Festival in 2006 or 2007. It’s called “An Oak Tree” and is by Tim Crouch. I had a ton of fun doing it”.

The Runner: “What made you take this role?”

Marcus Youssef: “The above, and also because it’s – as far as I know – telling a story about someone or something in a part of the world that is meaningful to me. I am the son of a Middle Eastern immigrant, and have family there, and so experiences of that world are both super important to me, and also something I don’t have a ton of direct experience of. It’s also a part of the world that’s often deeply misunderstood and misrepresented by North Americans. I also took it because the way it works (new actor every time etc.) was – I think –  a response to the fact that the playwright couldn’t do it himself, in Iran, and nor could he go abroad to perform it. So this formal device is a direct response to the challenging circumstances he found himself in – and it’s really worked. People all over the world are doing and seeing the show.”

The Runner: “What makes you still want to act, even though you write plays yourself and teach?”

Marcus Youssef: “Oh, lord. Ego, partly. I like people being forced to pay attention to me. I’m also really interested in styles of live performance that consider the question of what it means to be highly present with each other as performers and audience members, in a room, together. There’s a potential for experience that is both highly intimate and also public. This show is a good example of that. So many of our socializing is also now mediated through devices with screens and we do so much socializing while we’re in little rooms, all alone (like I am this very moment). For me it’s important to keep fighting to what it means to be in a room with people and experience intimacy, or laughter, or subject matter we’d only normally communicate about from safety of our own little rooms. That strikes me as something that’s kind of fundamental to being human.”

Tickets prices start at $26 at www.TheCultch.com