Bethesda
By:
January 6, 2012
In a detention room of an international airport, an Arab woman and a CIA agent interrogate the forces that brought them together.
If you are in LA tonight, you should go out. But when you go out, don’t forget your ID.
Stop for a minute and consider, where do you fit into the surveillance society? Seamlessly, right? Hopefully under the radar, just out of earshot, blending in with the crowd. But what if you don’t, or you can’t? Or what if your task is to observe gaps in the flow, and determine, from their surround, what catastrophes they may, or may not, intimate?
Specifically, HiLobrow encourages you to go out and see a dramatic reading of Bethesda, an austere, chilling new play written and directed by Chris Rossi, with Anna Khaja and Mike Wiles. HiLobrow likes dramatic readings: with just voices and bodies in space, of which you in the audience are another, and with no set or special effects for comfortable distance, one cannot help but be drawn in; perhaps, even implicated…
Bethesda will be read as part of the LA Arts District Winterfest 2012, which includes artwork, live music, theater, and poetry, running from Jan. 5 – 8. Winterfest is meant as “an exploration of the possibilities for artistic cross-pollination between playwrights, visual artists, and musicians.”
Chris Rossi’s work mixes violence, desire, politics, and psychology into a potent, disturbing brew. To pique your interest, we’ll preview a bit of the stone tape here:
A table, two chairs.
Zara, seated. She wears jeans and a salwar kameez.
Paul, standing. He wears a suit.
PAUL
Take me back.
ZARA
I woke in the dark.
PAUL
Who was there?
ZARA
Only my son.
PAUL
What did you do?
ZARA
Kissed him goodbye.
PAUL
After you prayed.
ZARA
We did it together.
PAUL
You left him behind.
ZARA
He knew I’d return.
PAUL
Is that what he thinks?
ZARA
I want a lawyer.
PAUL
We’re not there yet.
ZARA
No? Where are we?
She looks at him. He looks away.
ZARA
I let you sleep.
PAUL
Where did you go?
ZARA
To the mountains.
PAUL
Straight from the hotel?
Zara struggles to resist the memory… then:
ZARA
Not directly…
(beat)
I stood by the door. You made no sound. I hung the sign. So the maid would not disturb. I left to get us chai. To walk. To put my body in the sun. To think. About life… with a secret. A secret of you. Inside me. I had no direction.
(beat)
I walked very far. From the Palm Jumeirah to the mainland. I turned back… once. I looked up and found our window.
(beat)
I kept moving. Between the burkhas and pedicabs and diesel fumes and glass and steel. At a souk I bought two chais. I looked through the traffic and saw I was… across the street from the station house. I remembered I had left my bag there the night before. I crossed the street. I walked up to the doorway. I entered the code. I went inside. Down the steps. Three flights. There was another door, another code. Beyond that… a room.
(beat)
They let me inside.
PAUL
You didn’t have clearance.
ZARA
By then? I did. God knows I worked for it.
PAUL
Who was there?
ZARA
Three men. I had not seen them before.
PAUL
Operatives?
ZARA
(nods)
They knew you. They called me over.
(beat)
These men were reviewing tapes. On a laptop. Tapes of… an encounter. A session.
(beat)
The purpose of the video was for these men to… learn what they could about the… effectiveness of… certain techniques.
(beat)
A “hot wash.” Do you know this word?
PAUL
What?
ZARA
Paul?
PAUL
(distracted)
No.
ZARA
A “hot wash?”
She looks at him. He looks away.
More info:
Bethesda
Written and Directed by Chris Rossi with Anna Khaja and Mike Wiles
Friday, January 6, 2012 @ 8 PM
2012 Arts District Winterfest in collaboration with Padua Playwrights
Lot 613 in Downtown Arts District @ 613 Imperial St., Los Angeles, 90021
More information: http://artsdistrictwinterfest.com