Stage Door News
Stage Door News
Onelight Theatre returns to Harbourfront Centre with its newest creation, Asheq: Ritual Music to Cure a Lover, on stage December 5th to 8th, 2018. Set in a “vacuity of a place and time” on the shores of the Persian Gulf, Asheq is the engrossing story of forbidden love, a family divided by long-held secrets and a community torn between stifling traditions and modern freedom.
Blending music, projections, and live storytelling Asheq tell the captivating tale of a father’s life and death battle with himself and his son. The play culminates in music and movement, as the son is forced into a ritual zar/exorcism ceremony to rid him of a “sickness” --- his love for an outcast woman.
Onelight’s Shahin Sayadi says: "Asheq: Ritual Music to Cure a Lover brings several love stories to the stage – there is young love, passionate love, parental love, and spiritual love. These love stories inevitably lead to conflicts – relationships shift, twist, and are ultimately torn apart. Making this play took me on both a physical journey to my birthplace, the Persian Gulf, and an artistic journey of seeing the story from multiple perspectives and finding ways to bring these experiences to the stage.”
Asheq was developed under the leadership of Artistic Director Shahin Sayadi and recently debuted in Halifax at the Prismatic Arts Festival. Sayadi, brings to life a multitude of characters, their loves and their struggles, their births and deaths, all laid bare on stage in a time- bending, perspective-shifting tale that takes audiences inside the inner struggles of characters and the inevitable clashes in the family and community.
To authentically situate the play on the Persian Gulf coast, Onelight Theatre has commissioned internationally-renowned musicians Habib Meftahboushehri (Iran/France) and Mohsen Sharifian (Iran), with the additional contribution of Toronto-based composer Sina Bathaie, to bring to life the rich and eclectic music of Southern Iran. Shahin Sayadi also travelled to Iran to film pivotal scenes that are interjected into the production through projections.
Having travelled the world to develop this work, Sayadi and his Onelight Theatre team are thrilled to be back in Toronto to bring its newest work to local audiences.
ASHEQ: RITUAL MUSIC TO CURE A LOVER
by Shahin Sayadi, presented in association with Harbourfront Centre
December 5 – 7, 2018 – 8:00 pm
Media Night December 5
Matinee December 8th – 4:00 pm
Harbourfront Centre Theatre
231 Queens Quay W, Toronto, ON M5J 2G8, Canada
Tickets $18.85 - $24.50 available in person, by phone at 416-973-4000 or online
Running time: 60 minutes I Suitable for teenagers and adults
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Photo: Shahin Sayadi. ©2018 Shauna Alexander.
2018-11-13
Toronto: "Asheq: Ritual Music to Cure a Lover" plays at Harbourfront December 5-8