Homeless festivals

Two theatre festivals were suddenly cancelled for lack of venues. Whose fault is it? Nehad Selaiha wonders

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Hi, Abeer. Any news? I asked on the phone one sultry morning in late July. I dont think there is any hope we can pull it off this year, said Abeer. We have appealed to the minister of culture as a last resort. Its all on his desk, but we havent heard any thing yet and time is running out, she added desperately.

The it in question was the second women directors festival, the first session of which was a resounding success last summer and raised so many hopes. I was shocked at the news; knowing how things are run at the devilishly bureaucratic Cultural Palaces organization, I had expected some last minute hitches and delays, but not this. Only a week before I had seen Ali at Studio Emadedin shepherding the 4-member selection committee appointed by Ahmed Nawwar, the head of the organization, earlier this year, to preview Nora Amins solo performance, Memory of a Life, which they later decided to schedule for the opening. For months, Abeer Ali, the founder of the prestigious and highly popular Al-Mesaharati independent theatre troupe and one of the most dynamic workers in the theatre department of the Cultural Palaces organization a small contingent of dedicated artists who keep theatre alive in the provinces has been doing this and more, scouting the whole country for the best that local women directors can offer and intensively communicating with their Arab sisters in the hope of transforming the festival into a pan-Arab celebration of female creativity. Single-handedly, she ensured the participation of six of the top female directors in the Arab world, four of whom pledged to bring along performances gratis in exchange for air fare and accommodation. The Lebanese Nidal Al-Ashqar and the Tunisian Ragaa bin Ammar would have been among the honorees and speakers.

That the air fare item proved a stumbling block and entailed arduous negotiations and a lot of bargaining with the foreign cultural relations department was not surprising, and has not been Abeers major worry. Flying artists from one place to another is a perennial problem that festival organizers all over the world have learnt to get round or tackle somehow; at worst, she could apply to the Roberto Cimetta Fund which operates in the Mediterranean region to help with the travel expenses of her guests. But such application take time, a sense of which most Egyptian bureaucrats seem to utterly lack, and she was kept dangling in mid air without a clear yes or no. By mid July, things still looked quite uncertain and as the date of the festival kept changing, she became progressively depressed, writhing with embarrassment every time one the guests rang up or emailed for information. Fortunately, the guests, being women and Arab, were quite understanding and keenly supportive. They knew that in deeply entrenched patriarchal societies, such feminist ventures are usually nonchalantly treated by the males in power and can run into plenty of difficulties. Even at this late hour, the festival could have been saved.

What finally dealt it the death blow was the lack of suitable performance spaces. Last year the festival was held at Fatma Rushdi floating theatre by courtesy of Ashraf Zaki, the head of the State-Theatre sector. At the opening, I clearly remember all the critics there telling the newly-appointed Nawwar that he could not always rely on the good will of rival organizations and urging him to make giving the Cultural Palaces at least one Cairo venue his top priority. Formerly, the organization had three; but Al-Samir (in Agouza) was rashly pulled down years ago and the land on which it stood has been the subject of a seemingly irresolvable legal battle since; the other two Manf hall (at the back of the Balloon theatre in Agouza) and the open-air floating theatre in Giza were put out of action after the Beni Sweif tragedy in 2005 pending making them secure against fire hazards. For reasons best known to himself, however, Nawwar has done nothing so far, and the result was exactly what the critics had predicted and warned against last year.

You cannot shilly-shally over the date of a festival then expect people to drop everything and come to your rescue at a moments notice. Had the festival taken place in mid July, as originally planned, there would have been no space problem; for the whole of July, Fatma Rushdi theatre stood idle, crying out to be used. By mid June, however, most of the top-ranking officials in the Cultural Palaces organization seemed to dissolve into thin air. Ali tried frantically to track them down and get them to officially secure the theatre in time for the festival and was repeatedly thwarted. And since, like most government departments, the Cultural Palaces is rigidly hierarchical and over sensitive about observing the chain of command, Ali could not take matters into her own hands and address the head of the state-theatre organization directly. While her superiours were frolicking on the sea shore, she was wringing her hands in agony. By the time they got back, it was already too late. The Comedy theatre company was preparing to launch a spectacular vehicle for Fifi Abdou called Rawayeh.

That so much hard work and the hopes of scores of young artists should come to naught is not only a scandal but a real crime. Such crass indifference and dereliction of duty should be punishable by law. That the credibility of the festival has sustained irreparable damage is bad enough; but what could compensate Ali for her loss of face with all her contacts and her heart-wringing disappointment? When she moans about the national reputation of Egypt which has been wantonly dragged in the mud, I can only tell her that she has been a fool to give way to illusions and entrust her dreams and energies to people who care not a jot for them, or for theatre in general. But has not this been the sad story of scores of artists in my experience? Hani El-Mettenawi, a co- founder of the Shrapnel theatre group who has struggled for years to create an annual theatrical pool for fellow independent artists and managed, with the help of Al-Hanager cultural centre and its director, Huda Wasfi, to stage six successful festivals in succession, had to cancel the event this year after Al-Hanager was closed down (for the third time in 12 months) for the same reasons as the Cultural Palaces Manf hall and Giza floating theatre. Neither he, nor anyone, can understand why the two former costly operations failed to make the place secure. With no money to afford an alternative space (as he did one year, renting the theatre of the Russian cultural centre in Doqqi), he had to stoically swallow his disappointment the same as Ali. That so many wonderful young artists, with so much energy, talent and dedication could find no place to bring them together and host their creations is literally a tragedy. Of the three theatre festivals we expected in August, only the one organized by El-Sawy cultural centre has materialized, opening last Sunday. But this I keep for next week.