Strange how quickly history detaches itself from your memory. We had gradually come to think here that the camping uprising in Tahrir Square in Cairo was a kind of summer of love. That everyone was there singing together stuffing roses into cannon shells and that the whole world was just for giving each other love and hugs.
Time for a lesson in rebellion.
So the show 'Lessons in Revolting' does just that: teach a lesson about how rebellion works. Half documentary, half art and half Belgian. The Fleming Ruud Gielens, perhaps unwillingly endowed with the appearance of a classic skinhead/feltball hooligan, teamed up with Egyptian theatre-maker Laila Soliman to transform the feel of Tahrir Square into art with a number of Egyptian actors and dancers. The piece is a combination of dance and video, where, especially in the first half, the video more than wins over the live performed dance.
Indeed, that video contains footage that Al Jazeera has not shown because they are still on the makers' camera. The documentary footage begins on the eve of the uprising in January 2011, when the group of students hoped in good spirits to overthrow the regime in a few days. The piece ends with footage and memories of August 2011, just a few weeks ago, when the upbeat, yet violent revolution reaches a deep impasse during the deposed president's trial Mubarak.
The film footage is attractive and exciting, especially as it features women (the four creators), but especially women. And women were and still are the great absentees of the Arab Spring. So you get a more nuanced picture of the Egyptians and of the revolt in that square, and you sympathise with what happened that February month, even if it remains distant.
Towards the end, the tone changes. It becomes grim. Bit creepy even. Ruud Gielen's hooligan appearance, combined with his furious head and gestures, contrasts ugly with the much more serene heads of the Egyptians. But they compensate for this again by the lyrics, which not only flow over us in a relentless stream, but are harsh, fanatical and not very peaceful. Here there are no happy people clamouring for change, but rage prevails.
Popular anger is something you better not encounter. Once a genie is out of the bottle, you cannot get it back in until it has had its share of blood and hatred. By now, a lot of dictators around the world know that. So do we, viewers of 'Lessons in Revolting', now.
The show is still playing until Sunday 18 September 2011 in the Small Hall of the Rotterdam Schouwburg. Enquiries: www.deinternationalekeuze.nl
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