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Title: Homebody/Kabul by Tony Kushner ISBN: 1-55936-209-X Publisher: Theatre Communications Group Pub. Date: May, 2002 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.11 (9 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: The great dramatist of our time takes on Afghanistan
Comment: I have been a huge Tony Kushner fan ever since i read and subsequently performed in Angels in America my first and second years of college. I bought Homebody/Kabul as soon as it came out in paperback, and was fortunate enough to see it performed at the Intiman Theater in Seattle recently. After reading and seeing this play, my love for Kushner and his work has only deepened.
At this point, to call Kushner a master of language is to belabor the point. He capable of provoking any reaction under the sun, from hilarity to pathos to utter despair, with a simple, poetic phrase one moment, then a completely different reaction the next. I also won't waste time your time with my interpretation of the "message" of the play, though it certainly has many messages. The first act of Homebody/Kabul consist of one character (the Homebody) sitting in a chair recounting a selective history of Afghanistan mixed in with stories from her life, for an entire hour! Now, read on the page this can get tedious at times, though the stories are interesting. But Ellen McLaughlin, the masterful actor who performed the role in Seattle, sat on stage in one place for that whole hour and commanded the entire attention of the audience. It was mind-boggling, awe-inspiring, transporting, and reminded me forcibly of the difference between reading and performance. McLaughlin took the, admittedly brilliantly constructed, words on the page and turned them into something vital, poetic, and magical.
The rest of the play deals with the aftermath of the Homebody's decision to go to Kabul and disappear. Her husband Milton and her daughter Priscilla, hearing she has been killed, go to Kabul to recover her body. Soon evidence turns up that she may have taken the veil and married a Muslim man. But she is never actually seen again, leaving the other characters to come to their own conclusions and deal with her disappearance as best they can. Along the way we are treated to hilariously funny moments, such as Priscilla almost setting her burqua on fire with a cigarrette and Milton trying opium and heroin with junkie NGO employee Quango Twistleton, and heartbreaking ones such as an Afghan woman's multilingual rant about the state of her country and a man moved to tears by a Frank Sinatra song.
As a whole the play is certainly not perfect, it is sometimes unwieldy and some scenes seem under developed. But for me this is more than made up for by its scope, ambition, and searching intelligence. This is not Tony Kushner telling us what to think, he is presenting us with historical information filtered through the eyes of some deeply flawed but fascinating and ultimately human characters. In the end, he does not lay blame for the miserable state of Afghanistan on this or that country or faction, but shows how eveyone is responsible and no one wants to take the responsibility of really making it right. See it performed if you can, but if you can't, read the script, mull it over, and come to your own conclusions.
Rating: 1
Summary: Deathly pretentious and preachy
Comment: After reading, watching and enjoying such plays such as Angels parts 1 and 2 I was excited to learn that Kushner had a new play on the stage, Homebody/Kabul. However after reading and painfully forcing myself to watch this beast of a play I wish that I had never heard of it.
Homebody starts off with a 30+ min monolouge that is essentially a history lesson of how the world esp. the West has raped and denuded the peoples of Afghanistan. Clerly this monolouge is meant to grab the attention of the audience via Fox/CNN news sensationalistic yellow journalism tactics and evoke some sense of disgust or rage. I personally simply felt insulted that I was subjected to such a snorefest of a history lesson whose dumbed down antics were supposed to make me "think" yet only made me wish that I had stayed home and watched the history channel instead. Next we have Kushner's patented rant/rave morality lessons that are delivered with the obtuse handling of an embittered child. The character motivations were sparatic and inconsistant. Each action to reaction seemed more implausable than the next not to mention improbable within the world that was created for us.
Another huge fault of this play is Kushner's cliche facination with the obnoxious Western tourist character. His play tries to evoke shame and self disgust with our western society however it comes across once again as a them good, we bad type of situation. As has been said before a great or even good piece of art is not moral it simply explores what is moral.
I must say however that Kushner does have a wonderful turn of phrase in this play as well as a poetic spirit that can at it's best keep us guessing as to whether or not the play might have some redeeming quality. But quite frankly I have to say that if you read the afterward in the TCG printing of the script you can get all of the same information and tone as you would in the 4 hour read or dramatic version. To put it simply when Kushner is at his best, no one is better. when Kushner is at his worst, there is no one worse. And this is by far his worst.
Rating: 5
Summary: HOMEBODY KABUL IS THE THING THAT RULE
Comment: Can you imagine a play that is awesome? I can, because I saw it last month at the Hillsboro community center for Arts Performance. It was Tony Kushners (no relation to Ashton : )) play called Homebody Kabul. What is good about it? The timeliness, and also how it relates to our situation in the Middle East and in Afghanistan and in Pakistan also right now. Of course, after I saw the play I immediately bought the book and then read the play in the book, and I was not disappointed--its Kushner's dramatic explication of important ideas that really made the characters "leap" off the page and into my imagination, not to mention how it made me think. I recommend this book to the socially-minded literati of today's generation X youth. Good? Yes it is. Also check out his other play, Angles in America.
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Title: Thinking About the Longstanding Problems of Virtue and Happiness: Essays, a Play, Two Poems, and a Prayer by Tony Kushner ISBN: 155936100X Publisher: Theatre Communications Group Pub. Date: November, 1995 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Angels in America: Millennium Approaches by Tony Kushner ISBN: 1559360615 Publisher: Theatre Communications Group Pub. Date: April, 1993 List Price(USD): $11.95 |
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Title: A Bright Room Called Day by Tony Kushner ISBN: 155936078X Publisher: Theatre Communications Group Pub. Date: December, 1994 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Topdog/Underdog by Suzan-Lori Parks ISBN: 1559362014 Publisher: Theatre Communications Group Pub. Date: 04 February, 2002 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: Death & Taxes: Hydriotaphia and Other Plays by Tony Kushner ISBN: 1559361565 Publisher: Theatre Communications Group Pub. Date: August, 2000 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
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