Tickets are $29 for VocalEye users, while they last. Please call the Box Office to purchase at 604-687-1644. This performance will be followed by a Talk Back with the cast.
VocalEye Members may reserve a Theatre Buddy at least 48 hours in advance by email or phone 604-364-5949.
Described by Eileen Barrett
When Abdul’s cricket team decides to take action to end their losing streak, they talk of recruiting Abdul’s brother, Hasan, who is an expert at the sport. But bringing Hasan from India to Canada will take more than just a plane ticket, and not all members of the team agree with the high cost. Follow this heartwarming story of how home can be found in sport and unite family across nations.
“I always wanted to write a play about cricket. I imagined these men on stage, dressed in their whites, but that was all. I had no story. Yet. A few years ago, I was in Bombay researching the red-light district for my novel, The Parcel. I can’t remember why, but a friend of mine took me to Dongri, a predominantly Muslim area in Bombay, on his motorcycle. He started chatting with the owner of a chicken slaughterhouse who happened to be a friend of his. When the owner found out that I lived in Canada, his eyes lit up. “I have a sister in Saskatoon,” he said. It startled me. When you’re surrounded by blood and dead chickens, flies and motorcycles, you don’t really think: “Yes, Saskatoon.” But it was exactly what I needed for the play. Once I came back, I thought of that chicken slaughterhouse and realized there was a connection between the two worlds: Bombay and Canada. The wounds of one world open up in another. And wounds are tricky beings. They remain masked until the most seemingly benign things cause them to rupture all over again.” -Anosh Irani
Written by Anosh Irani
Directed by Rachel Ditor
The play takes place at a chicken center in Bombay and in the locker room of the West Coast Cricket Club in Vancouver. The time is the present.
CHARACTERS
HASAN: 17 years old. Madly, passionately in love with cricket. Works at a chicken slaughterhouse in Bombay.
ABDUL: In his 30s. Hasan’s brother. Loves his brother and his cricket. Illegally works as a cook in a Vancouver restaurant.
BABA: In his 60s. Owner of the slaughterhouse.
HASEENA: Sweet 16. Studies hard, buys chickens from Hasan.
TONY: 30s. Captain of the East Coast Cricket Club in Vancouver. Abdul’s best buddy.
RAM: 30s, rich. Opening batsman for the club.
RANDI: South Indian male, 40s. Team sponsor and player.
DOC: A surgeon from Bombay, Late 50s, plays cricket for the club.
SAM: 30s. Has very little talent, but the team allows him to play anyway.
REVIEWS
“a “tale of two cities” and a whole lot more, including the game of cricket. On a single stage the two worlds of (old) Bombay and (new) Vancouver line up side-by-side. Each side deals with slaughter : the right, a chicken butchery shoppe in India, the left, a local cricket team’s locker room off Brockton Oval — where opposing teams religiously knacker them.
The “whole lot more” that North Vancouver’s Irani attempts to draw into his script involves riffs on frat-boy cameraderie, sexism, karma, patriarchy, religious tribal wars, immigration conflicts, schoolyard bullying, local Mumbai gang violence — love, loyalty, fate, loss — all this amidst endless banter about the wizardry and wicketry that are what the game of cricket is all about.” –BrokenLeg Reviews
“The woven threads are much like an Indian carpet: lively, bustling and an interesting cross-section of Indian society. If you’ve ever been to Delhi, Calcutta or Bombay, you’ll know what I mean. Everything all mixed together, all moving together, all struggling for a little bit of luck.” –Jo Ledingham
SUPPORT MATERIALS
CRICKET CRASH COURSE
Cricket is played on a giant oval field, with a rectangular pitch in the middle. Each team has 11 players, and the teams take turns batting and fielding. The batting team sends two people to the pitch at a time. The two batters stand at either end of the pitch in front of a wicket (a structure made of three wooden stakes). One batter tries to hit a ball that is delivered by the bowler. In addition to the bowler and the wicket-keeper (who uses their bat to prevent the ball from hitting the wicket) the other nine members of the team in the field stand at strategic spots around the oval cricket ground. Once the ball bounces, the batter tries to smack it with his bat. If the ball hits the wicket, the batter is out. If the batter hits the ball, he then races to the opposite wicket, while his teammate races toward his wicket, trading places in the process. Runs are scored according to how far the ball flies or how many times the runners can tag the wickets with their bats before the fielding team retrieves the ball or throws them out. (Adapted from Liz Clark, “Cricket for Dummies,” The Washington Post)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tx32vvWiaKM
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