Noura
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Cititour.com Review
Much like the overabundant meal the title character of Heather Raffo’s “Noura” serves her guests at Christmas dinner, there’s far too much food – food for thought, I mean – for audiences to easily digest in this provocative new work, now at Playwrights Horizons under Joanna Settle’s savvy direction.
Indeed, Raffo, who also turns in a powerful performance as Noura, has a lot she wants to tell us: about the experience of being an Iraqi refugee in America; handling the challenges of forging one’s personal and political identity; finding the balance between family – especially motherhood – and individual fulfillment, and, above all, satisfying the almost impossible need to both hold on and let go of the past.
And perhaps even more daring, or one might say foolhardy, the minute when it’s revealed –quite early on in the piece -- that Noura’s name has been Americanized to Nora, you realize Raffo is also out to pen a modern-day variation one of the world’s greatest plays: “Ibsen’s A Doll’s House.” (So what if there are no doors on Andrew Liberman’s beautifully modernist set?) It’s all a very tall order for one 90-minute play, so it’s not shocking that “Noura” sometimes falls short of its ambition.
The same might be said of our protagonist: One might think that, after eight years in New York, Noura, an architect turned math tutor, would have settled into a peaceful existence with her husband Tareq (Nabel Elouhabi), a former surgeon who has finally escaped working for sandwich chain Subway, and their 11-year-old, thoroughly Americanized son Yazen (an adorable Liam Campora). But even though the couple have even just received their American passports, there is no vacation, at least from Noura’s own internal strife, on the horizon.
Noura is a restless woman, constantly thinking of her homeland, reliving her life choices and questioning her own motives. She has also, for a number of reasons, sponsored an Iraqi orphan for two decades named Maryam (the superb Dahlia Azama), who is now a college student visiting the Big Apple – and who turns out to be a very different woman than either Noura or Tareq (who now calls himself Tim) might have imagined.
Equally at odds, with himself and his adopted country, is the couple’s longtime friend Rafa’a (a very appealing Michael David), a successful obstetrician. Unlike Noura’s family, who are Christian, he’s Muslim, and a chilling anecdote he shares with Noura about why he had to deliver a baby in a taxicab is a potent reminder of the prejudice running rampant in Trump’s America.
That story is one of many told throughout “Noura” that will likely make audiences sit up and listen. Indeed, Raffo’s prose is often breathtakingly beautiful and her messages worth hearing. Unfortunately, though, Raffo’s highly verbal characters never take a breath – or allow you to catch yours.
By Brian Scott Lipton
Visit the Site
https://www.playwrightshorizons.org
Cast
Dahlia Azama, Liam Campora, Matthew David, Nabil Elouahabi, Heather Raffo
Open/Close Dates
Opening 11/27/2018
Closing 12/30/2018
Theatre Info
Mainstage Theater
131 West 55th Street
Neighborhood: West 50s
New York, NY 10019
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