SANTI & NAZ

Soho Theatre

★★★★

“Innocence and playfulness mingle with a satire that bites when we least expect it”

Guleraana Mir’s beautifully constructed short play, “Santi and Naz”, is a deceptively innocent and poetic account of an enduring friendship between two young women who grew up in pre-partition India. They are living in an unnamed village, soon to be split in two by new borders that sliced through the lives of millions of unsettled people. The blood spilled still stains the ground decades later. The play, however, avoids making any political commentary on the consequences of (and widespread opposition to) partition. Instead, it zooms in on the very personal effects. And by looking at the world through childish eyes, it becomes more emotively powerful.

Nehru’s (in)famous ‘Tryst with Destiny’ address opens the play, his crackling voiceover heralding the ‘stroke of the midnight hour’. As his words fall and fracture onto a darkened stage, Santi (Aiyana Bartlett) is writing a letter, destined never to be delivered, to childhood friend Naz (Farah Ashraf). The intimacy is ingrained in her memories. Laura Howard’s evocative lighting shifts to warmer shades and we find Santi and Naz years earlier, playing games, dancing, teasing and swooning over the local heartthrob. It is a coming-of-age story whose lightness belies the darkness lurking beneath. Over time that darkness spreads like a shadow between them – a representation of the cultural changes that force them apart. The performances are undeniably strong throughout: Bartlett’s vulnerable and romantic Santi seeking shelter in books and writing, while Ashraf’s more defiant Naz seeks to defy the arranged marriage that threatens her dreams of happiness.

Mir’s script (co-written with afshan d’souza-lodhi) has a natural flow, accentuated by the gorgeous chemistry between the two performers. Innocence and playfulness mingle with a satire that bites when we least expect it. Occasionally the writing confuses, and we are unsure whether there is a sexual undertone to their friendship; but we never doubt the resilience and indestructible strength of their connection. A connection that remains even when separated. Bartlett and Ashraf evocatively present a personal tragedy that mirrors the political one. It skirts around it at times and occasionally overlooks its Western audience, but ultimately it does shine a light on an often-misunderstood period of history.

It is, unfortunately, a universal story. Santi is Sikh and Naz is Muslim; a fact that is neither here nor there for them. Until the British withdrawal. The pair interject their dialogue with uncannily accurate impersonations of the key figures – such as Gandhi and Mountbatten – the latter especially whose actions and decisions affected the lives of those he had little connection with or knowledge about. The weight of the events ‘forces the air from our lungs’ as Naz points out. ‘I no longer know where my people are’.

Poignantly, we come full cycle for the play’s conclusion. Separated on the stage by a wedge of black light, the two characters are back where they started. Looking back, they are both yearning for the other. A friendship divided, a culture split apart, and a country thrown into two opposing sides. The line is drawn. But we are pulled back into the deeply personal: two people who refuse to see their differences. A heartfelt tale of innocence and experience that earns, and deserves, our undivided attention.

SANTI & NAZ

Soho Theatre

Reviewed on 23rd January 2025

by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Paul Blakemore

Previously reviewed at this venue:

BALL & BOE – FOR FOURTEEN NIGHTS ONLY | ★★★★ | December 2024

GINGER JOHNSON BLOWS OFF! | ★★★ | September 2024

COLIN HOULT: COLIN | ★★★★ | September 2024

VITAMIN D | ★★★★ | September 2024

THE DAO OF UNREPRESENTATIVE BRITISH CHINESE EXPERIENCE | ★★★★ | June 2024

BABY DINOSAUR | ★★★ | June 2024

JAZZ EMU | ★★★★★ | June 2024

BLIZZARD | ★★★★ | May 2024

BOYS ON THE VERGE OF TEARS | ★★★★ | April 2024

SPENCER JONES: MAKING FRIENDS | ★★★★ | April 2024

DON’T. MAKE. TEA. | ★★★★★ | March 2024

PUDDLES PITY PARTY | ★★ | March 2024

SANTI & NAZ

★★★★

“You will see the world in a different way when you emerge from the darkness of the performance space”

Now Is The Time To Say Nothing is one of those rare events where you drop your old ideas of what theatre might be at the door, realise that a new paradigm is here, and that you are lucky enough to be part of it. In 2014, director, dramaturg and participatory artist Caroline Williams and Syrian filmmaker Reem Karssli got together at the prompting of a group of teenagers connected with the Young Vic’s Taking Part project. The teenagers wished to understand, in a deeper way, life in a war zone from sources other than news broadcasts. Brought together via Skype and email, Williams and the group followed Reem and her family’s daily life in war torn Damascus for several years. Now Is The Time To Say Nothing, now at the Battersea Arts Centre, is Williams and Karssli’s record of those events, including footage from Karssli’s film Everyday, Everyday. It is put together as an immersive theatre experience in which the audience discovers, in a brief 55 minutes, what it is like to live in a war zone, and then to be a refugee fleeing from Syria and surviving a dangerous sea voyage in order to reach the safer shores of Europe.

Now Is The Time To Say Nothing is not a show for a large audience, and that is one of the sources of its power. In fact, there is space for only a dozen or so people at a time, and it begins more like an evening at home in front of the television. The house staff usher you into a darkened space where an old fashioned television awaits each participant, complete with a comfortable chair to sit in, and a pair of headphones to place on your head. The chairs are arranged in a circle, facing out, so you begin by feeling completely alone. The TV screen in front of you shows bright patterns which resolve into images of the first things ever broadcast. You, the viewer, are asked to think about the process in which the pictures in front of you are created. Meanwhile, the sounds in the headphones immerse you in a world of middle eastern music and then, the sound of planes overhead, bombs falling. The transition is beautifully done.

Through participatory action, you gain a deeper understanding of a refugee’s life. By means of viewing on the screens and hearing the sounds through the headphones you create your own theatrical experience. This is what makes Now Is The Time To Say Nothing uniquely transformative. You will see the world in a different way when you emerge from the darkness of the performance space.

This show is highly recommended, although do keep in mind the material is, at times, distressing with its depictions of war. But otherwise, go, and prepare for a theatrical metamorphosis.

Reviewed by Dominica Plummer

Photography by Paul Blakemore (from previous production)

SANTI & NAZ

Soho Theatre

★★★★

“Innocence and playfulness mingle with a satire that bites when we least expect it”

SANTI & NAZ

Soho Theatre

Reviewed on 23rd January 2025

by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Paul Blakemore

Previously reviewed at this venue:

SANTI & NAZ

SANTI & NAZ

SANTI & NAZ

Battersea Arts Centre

Reviewed – 3rd October 2019

★★★★

“You will see the world in a different way when you emerge from the darkness of the performance space”

This show is highly recommended, although do keep in mind the material is, at times, distressing with its depictions of war. But otherwise, go, and prepare for a theatrical metamorphosis.

Reviewed by Dominica Plummer

Photography by Paul Blakemore (from previous production)

Now is the Time to say Nothing

Battersea Arts Centre until 19th October

Previously reviewed at this venue: