Bashar Murkus and Khulood Basel - Khashabi Theatre
Suffocating tension that can even cause claustrophobia. A dangerous conversation between two men begins with a horrible terrorist incident occurred at a museum.
Introduction
What is terrorism? How can we define it? Palestinian director Bashar Murkus seeks to find an answer to
this very question, which led to the idea for the piece
‘THE MUSEUM’. To this end, attempts were made to deconstruct the term terrorism, and terms such as
radicalism, extremism, and violence were derived. He finds a clear dilemma at this point.
‘THE MUSEUM’ dissects the origins of violence, the indescribable the ‘banality of evil’, and the
similarities between individual and organized terrorism. He calls for a shift in perspective to focus on
the meaning of our actions, the (im)moral imperatives that oppress us, and the reasons for trying to break
away from them. After premiering in Haifa in 2019, it was performed at the Festival d’Avignon(France,
2021) and Nuderzon Performing Arts Festival(Netherlands, 2021) etc.
There is a terrorist attack on a contemporary art museum. Forty-nine children and a teacher were killed
and the man who committed the attack was sentenced to death by lethal injection.
His original plan, to be killed by the police inside the museum, has failed. He was arrested,
interrogated, and sentenced to death. For the execution to be carried out, he had to wait for seven years.
A week before the execution, he insists on meeting the detective who investigated his case. He convinces
him to be the last person he meets and to join him for his last supper.
At the final evening the two men meet alone in a locked room in the building where the capital punishment
will be carried out. This is how an unsettling and destructive conversational battle begins. The moment
when the two meet the audience, they begin a dangerous and cunning game to explore the meaning of death
they desire.
Born 1992 in Kufer Yasif in the north of occupied Palestine, is a Palestinian theatre director and
writer based in Haifa. He began his theatrical career after receiving his BA from the University of
Haifa Theatre department in 2011.
Murkus is a founding member of Khashabi Ensemble and, since 2015, he is the artistic director of the
Khashabi Theatre, an Independent Palestinian theatre based in Haifa. His works have been staged in
theatres in Brussels, Genk, Gent, Antwerp, Bern, London, Dublin, Marseilles, Paris, Tunis, Berlin,
Hanover and New York.
He also teaches acting and directing at various academic and arts institutions in Haifa and Europe.
Since 2011, Murkus has directed nearly 20 theatre productions, expressing his deep artistic,
political, social and humanistic visions and providing an intense theatrical glimpse into contemporary
Palestinian
culture. These productions are an outcome of profound and extensive collaborative research projects,
engaging actors, scholars, designers and musicians who explore complex social, political and
philosophical themes.
Murkus’ performative language is highly sensual, based not only on written drama, but on sound,
staggering visual images, provocative intertextual allusions to canonical drama and corporal gestures
and movements. This is post-dramatic theatre at its best.
Murkus creates immersive, empathic fictional worlds, built and broken into fragments, by engaging the
viewers' universal human vulnerability.
writer·Director Bashar Murkus
Cast Henry Andrawes, Ramzi Maqdisi
Co-researcher Majd Kayyal
Dramaturgy Khulood Basel
Scenography Majdala Khoury
Music Producer Nihad Awidat
Lighting Designer·Technical Director Muaz Aljubeh
Translation Lore Baeten
Assistant Director Samera Kadry
PR Mustafa A. Qablawi
International Touring Dalit Itai, as is presenting arts
Production Khashabi Theatre
Producer Khulood Basel
Co-productionSchlachthaus Theatre - Bern, Switzerland, Moussem Nomadic Arts Centre – Brussels,
Belgium, Arts Centre Vooruit - Gent, Belgium.
With the support of The Robert Weil Family Foundation. THE MUSEUM was developed, in part, at the 2018
Sundance Institute Theatre Lab in Morocco. and at MASS MOCA Museum in North Adams.
Bashar Murkus and Khulood Basel - Khashabi Theatre
Khashabi is an independent Palestinain theatre in the city of Haifa. It was founded in 2011 as the
artists’ collective Khashabe Ensemble. In 2015 the group achieved a physical space in the Wadi Salib
neighborhood that was emptied from the majority of its original inhabitants 1948.
Khashabi works towards a Palestinian society that freely practices art and creativity as a natural right,
and strives to renew its cultural identity by placing independent culture front and centre.
Khashabi provides a space for artists to freely experiment, create, research and perform alternative
forms of theatre and art, and space where social, political and artistic taboos can be challenged,
creating an invigorating creative environment based on cooperation and mutual support.
Khashabi creates work through long-term journeys of artistic research and experimentation, emanating from
human values which the ensemble wishes to question with local and global audiences.