February 12, 2004
Actor-director to perform Dario Fo play on campus
A controversial and powerful play by a Nobel laureate will have a special one-night performance at the Faculty Club Feb. 24.
A Tale of a Tiger by Italian playwright Dario Fo features Ami Dayan, a renowned Israeli-American actor and director, who has adapted the play as a one-person show. The event, which begins at 7 p.m., will be followed by a reception. The performance is free but tickets are required; they are available 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. weekdays at the main English Department Office, A-101 Padelford. The office is closed noon to 1 p.m.
A Tale of a Tiger has won numerous awards and has been performed around the world. It was one of the hits of the Seattle Fringe Theatre Festival last year and played to capacity crowds at the Capitol Hill Arts Center.
The play is drawn from an ancient Chinese moral folk tale. It is the story of a dying soldier who is saved by a tigress, nourished and healed by her milk and saliva. His strength regained, the soldier must again decide about his personal and moral standards and answer the question, “How am I to live?”
The play has been described as “a politically charged one-man tour-de force.” Fo wrote the play in 1978. It was adapted in Israel in 1994 by Dayan, albeit with an alternate ending. Fo’s original ending, a political outcry for revolution against a leadership that misrepresents people morally, could well have been interpreted as a cry to arms against Israel’s government, which had just signed the Oslo peace accords. Dayan’s ending focuses on self-healing and growth.
The play will be performed at the UW with both endings, Fo’s original one and Dayan’s adaptation.
Dayan and the play have been brought to campus by Raimonda Modiano, professor of English and comparative literature and director of the Textual Studies Program.
“Dayan’s performance of this play, which I saw at the Capitol Hill Arts Center in October, was simply spectacular,” she says. “He roared like a tiger and made the audience attempt to do likewise. He was able to bring to life the rich humor of Fo’s inspiring play without letting go of its more serious ethical questions.
“What impressed me especially about the show was an unexpected second act following what appeared to be the closure of the play, in which Mr. Dayan performed the original ending of the play. As Mr. Dayan explained to the audience, the original ending, which stressed political action against the government which misrepresents the ethical values of its people, could not be performed in Israel at a time when Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s proposal to return Arab land in exchange for peace and recognition of Palestinian rights inspired direct threats against him — which, as it turns out, materialized a year later when Rabin was assassinated. The juxtaposition of the two endings made Mr. Dayan’s performance especially rich and valuable.”
Dayan is an experienced playwright, director, actor and teacher whose work includes tragedies, farce, comedies, satire, drama and musicals. He is currently the artistic director of the Hothouse Theatre Troupe and instructor at the Naropa University in Boulder and the National Theatre Conservatory in Denver.
