Murray Ross

On the terrorist trail: Sayyid Qutb in Greeley

Those of you who have looked at our current season know we're scheduled to premiere a new play next March called Dar al-Harb. The phrase is Arabic, and means "world of chaos" or "world of war" and refers to everything on earth not under Islamic rule.  In other words, it refers to us. I felt strongly our theatre should hold up the mirror to nature this season, and in some way reflect our engagement in the Middle East. After reading Lawrence Wright's wonderful book on the events leading to 9/11 called The Looming Tower I thought we might do a stage adaptation of the book, but then I learned the author was doing his own one man show called My Trip to Al Qaeda, which more or less pre-empted my idea.  I flew to New York to see the show, and didn't think much of it -- I thought it added nothing to the terrific book apart from making its author even more of a celebrity journalist. We have enough of those. But then I remembered that one of the book's central characters, Sayyid Qutb, the grandfather of Islamic radicalism and a profound influence on Osama Bin Laden, had spent a year in Colorado, where he learned to hate America.  And suddenly there loomed the subject of our forthcoming play: radical Islam in our own back yard.

My Open Heart and the Energy of Actors

As some of you know, a month ago, and much to my surprise, I had open heart surgery -- a routine triple bypass. I'm well on the road to full recovery, but for the moment I have a little time on my hands, and I thought to spend some of it in reflection, not so much about myself as about my longest running love, theatre.  And I thought I'd begin with an account of my latest theatrical adventure, followed by an encounter with actors that made me understand what "actors' energy" means in a whole new way.