The Wilma Presents the East Coast Premiere of SCORCHED 2/25 Thru 3/29

The Wilma Theater continues its 30th Anniversary Season with the East Coast Premiere of Scorched, directed by the Wilma's co-Artistic Director Blanka Zizka and written by highly acclaimed Lebanese-Canadian playwright Wajdi Mouawad.  An international tour de force, Scorched arrives in the U.S. having received more than 100 productions worldwide.  It has been translated into a dozen languages and is currently being adapted into a feature film.  The Wilma's production – only the second U.S. production of the play – begins previews on February 25, opens on March 4, and closes on March 29, 2009. Tickets start at $39 and are available at the Wilma Box Office by calling (215) 546-7824, visiting 265 S. Broad Street, or online at www.wilmatheater.org.

In this epic mystery, twins Janine and Simon receive a surprising request in their late mother's will: to deliver letters to a father they thought was dead and a brother they never knew existed. These tasks lead them on a suspenseful journey to the heart of their mother's war-torn Middle Eastern homeland. Unraveling the mystery, they learn about her concealed history as a political activist and prisoner of war and uncover shocking secrets about their own origins.  Variety says that "Scorched introduces a playwright with an important voice to the English language theater… attention must be paid."

The traumas of war depicted in Scorched reflect many countries that are facing civil wars and ethnic conflicts, but many of the play's events have historical Lebanese counterparts, as Wajdi Mouawad himself was a witness to the beginnings of Lebanon's civil war. In 1975, at only six years of age, Mouawad was a bystander to an attack on a bus full of civilians, a scene that is recounted in Scorched.

Despite this, Blanka Zizka stresses the universal aspects of the play.  She says, "Wajdi Mouawad is deeply interested in exploring both the human potential for hate, revenge and destruction and the potential for consolation, love and forgiveness. Scorched is both epic and an intimate family drama. As I was closely following the recent conflict in Gaza, the play's stubborn insistence to bear witness, to refuse silence and to speak has become even more potent."

The Wilma's production of Scorched features original music by Iraqi-American composer Amir ElSaffar.  With a fusion of contemporary jazz and traditional Middle Eastern influences, the score reflects ElSaffar's varied background as both an accomplished jazz trumpeter and santoor (Iraqi hammered dulcimer) player. He spent several years traveling throughout Iraq, the Middle East, and Europe, where he studied with masters of the music of his ancestry as well as masters of various other Arabic musical styles.  ElSaffar also composed music for the Wilma's 05-06 season production of Heather Raffo's 9 Parts of Desire.  Locally, he has also appeared at the Painted Bride Art Center, having received a commission from the center in 2006, and at the Philadelphia Art Museum.

The Scorched cast and design team features an international group of theater artists with roots in various parts of the world, including Lebanon, Iraq, Armenia, Jordan, Israel, India, Poland, Romania, and Germany.

The cast is Jolly Abraham as Sawda; Jacqueline Antaramian – 2006 Barrymore Award-winner for Outstanding Leading Actress in a Play for her solo performance in the Wilma's 9 Parts of Desire – as Nawal (40 – 45 years old); Aadya Bedi as Nawal (16 – 19 years old); Leila Buck as Janine; Janis Dardaris – who has previously appeared at the Wilma a total of six times, including productions such as The Magic Fire, Orpheus Descending, and Road – as Nawal (60 – 65 years old); Omar Koury as The Man/Antoine; Philadelphia-based actor Benjamin Lloyd – who was last seen at the Wilma in The Invention of Love – as Alphonse Lebel; J. Paul Nicholas as Nihad/Ralph; and Ariel Shafir as Simon/Wahab.

The design team is Set Designer Ola Maslik and Lighting Designer Thom Weaver who are both working with the Wilma for the first time; along with Costume Designer Oana Botez-Ban, who recently designed costumes for the Wilma's productions of Rock 'n' Roll and Eurydice; Barrymore Award-winning Sound Designer Jorge Cousineau, who has designed sound for numerous Wilma productions, most recently last season's Eurydice; and Composer Amir ElSaffar.

Wajdi Mouawad is an actor, director, translator, and playwright who was born in Lebanon in 1968.  In the script's introduction of Scorched, Mouawad is described as "Lebanese in his childhood, French in his way of thinking and Québécois in his theater.  That's what happens when you spend your childhood in Beirut, your adolescence in Paris and then try to become an adult in Montreal."  Mouawad's family fled civil war and moved to France in 1977 and finally immigrated to Montréal in 1983, where Mouawad entered the French section of The National Theatre School and graduated in 1991. He co-founded Theatre O Parleur in 1990 with Isabelle Leblanc.  For his first play, Willy Protagoras enfermé dans les toilettes, Mouawad won le Grand Prix de la Critique from the Association québécoise des critiques de théâtre.  He won the Governor General's Award from the Canada Council for the Arts for Littoral (Tideline), the first part of an intended tetralogy that has continued with Incendies (Scorched), which also won a Governor General's Award, and most recently, Forêts (Forests).  Other accolades include being named Chevalier de l'Ordre National des Arts et des Lettres in France, France's prestigious Molière Award (which Mouawad declined in protest to what he saw as the indifference of French theater directors to contemporary playwrights), and finalist for Canada's largest annual theater award, the Siminovitch Prize in playwriting. With a major following in French theater circles, Mouawad's plays have been translated into many languages and have played at numerous national and international venues.  Le Monde has saluted him as one of the world's most talented French-language playwrights.  In 2008 he became artistic director of the French theater section at the National Arts Centre.  Mouawad is currently touring with his one-man show, Seuls.

Scorched follows the return of twins to their late mother's Middle Eastern homeland, devastated by a civil conflict.  A distinguished panel will explore how civil, ethnic, and religious conflicts arise, as well as ways these knots, and their aftereffects on the individuals who live through them, might be unraveled.  Is it possible to recreate humanity in the aftermath of the atrocities that characterize this sort of conflict?  Panelists include Jonathan Glover, author of Humanity: A Moral History of the Twentieth Century, which was called "brilliant, haunting, and uniquely important" by Steven Pinker in The New York Times; author and former Beirut-based correspondent Helena Cobban, who recently published her seventh book, Re-engage! America and the World After Bush; and Judith Graves Miller, a recognized authority on French and Francophone theater and Professor and Chair of the Department of French at New York University.  Free for all subscribers and Scorched ticket-holders, otherwise $10.  Seating is limited.  For tickets, call the Box Office at (215) 546-7824 or email tickets@wilmatheater.org.  (Dates and times are subject to change.)

The Wilma Theater's Symposium Series is supported by The Wallace Foundation Excellence Award grant. The Wallace Foundation Excellence Awards were created to support exemplary arts organizations to pioneer effective practices to engage more people in high-value arts activities.

The Wilma Theater is partnering with Moore College of Art & Design on an interactive sculpture which will be on view in the Wilma's lobby during the run of Scorched.  After reading and researching the play, students from Professor Martha Gelarden's 3D Sculpture class will design and install the piece. The project is part of a joint collaboration between Moore's program, Culture in the Classroom and the Wilma's educational program, Wilma Classroom.  Both programs strive to bring learning to life by extending the boundaries of the traditional classroom.

Scorched has been funded by The Pew Center for Arts and Heritage, through The Philadelphia Theatre Initiative, with additional support from the Marketing Innovation Program.  Scorched is also supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts. The Wilma Theater's 30th Anniversary Sponsor is Rohm and Haas.  Sporting Club at the Bellevue is a Season Sponsor.  McCormick & Schmick's Seafood Restaurant is Artistic Lead Sponsor, and PECO is the Building the Audiences of Tomorrow Sponsor.  Additional support is given by the Charlotte Cushman Foundation.

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