Beirut – “Al-Quds Al-Arabi”: Five years following her last visit to Beirut, Reem Al-Banna decided to return to her audience, who longed for her as a human being, an artist and a fighter.
The title of the evening with Reem, “Oh, night, how long will it take you?” Atheer’s choice, and his immortal place in her heart. And she knows that it is in the hearts of her fans, lovers of her art, and Palestine, which inhabited it with pain, dream and hope.
“By night, how long you are” is the title of a Palestinian lullaby that ranked first in all her concerts, and is always dedicated to the mothers of the martyrs.
It is the prayer that she used to recite at the beginning of her concerts, and the audience adored her with her voice. After that prayer, she decided to open her life notebook from childhood to marriage, childbearing, and breastfeeding, until cancer decided to open its battle with it.
The evening with Reem Al-Banna is not like its predecessors, but rather has a different flavor that is more intimate, revealing, questions, and pain. It is a play “O Night, How Long Will You Be”, the script of which was prepared for the able theater by Rawan Halawi, directed by Salim Al-Awar, and shown at Al-Madina Theatre. In Reem’s last visit to Beirut in 2017, he had a chance meeting with Rawan Halawi. And she decided that the brilliant writer, director and actress of the monodrama would put her life on the Beirut stage.
They were brought together by necessary revealing sessions, and the recordings numbered 19. And they agreed on “Oh night, how long you are” as a title. Disease didn’t give her long, ferocious, and cancer defeated her on March 24, 2018.
Rawan Halawi kept the treasure that Reem Al-Banna secured for her. A treasure that was reflected in Lebanon’s recurring crises and the Corona pandemic, and the first show was on the 15th of this month. The show started as if Reem Al-Banna was regarding to present to the audience of Lebanon. Beginnings showed their shrinkage, and this is normal in the moments of the singer’s first confrontation with the audience. The lullaby was the prayer that Reem had been reciting since the age of 14. With the curtain lifted over the salon of Reem’s house, a struggle begins with her life from childhood to adolescence to marriage, childbearing, illness, and the relationship with the husband-man before and following illness.
In the intimate and honest disclosure with abundant detail, Reem Al-Banna entrusted the audience with her life and through Rawan Halawi. As if she was subconsciously aware that the disease would not give her mitigating reasons, nor would it be relieved of her. For this disclosure, Rawan Halawi deserved the Medal of Credit and Honesty. It was Reem Al-Banna who came from Nazareth. Reem is a strong fighter and fighter even during her journey with the damned chemotherapy, and with everything that surrounds her as an Arab in a hospital for the Zionist occupation, even if she is proud of its chief, the Palestinian Arab doctor.
Rawan Halawi excelled in mastering the Palestinian dialect, and in expressing pain, even Reem Al-Banna’s physical aches from cancer, and physical and psychological from her relationship with the other – the man. The man is the father first, the man the husband second. It was as if she was in the process of a message telling women not to be patient with injustice, and not to manage and keep quiet regarding violence. She was in a position of self-blame. So why the silence, and why the patience for a “possessive pressure” man?
When the disease hit Reem Al-Banna’s vocal cords, her psychological pain doubled. Why is my voice and not my hand? I left the question hanging between a little doubt and a lot of certainty, it is an active verb.
Her war once morest the occupation was, through her voice, “the voice of a weapon,” although she was aware in the depths of herself that “this enemy only understands the language of weapons.”
A successful monodrama by all standards, Rawan Halawi and director Salim Al-Awar managed to put her on stage for a person who had a great impact in her life and absence. And the public of Lebanon and the camps preserves her visits to a land that has been firmly established in her mind. Through “Sana Muhaidli and Lola Abboud”.
Rawan Halawi has handed over the trust she held for years to the public. And he, in turn, applauded more than once, even during the show, as well as at its conclusion. The presence of director Salim Al-Awar in this show was very special in its transformation into flesh, blood and soul, in solidarity and solidarity with the creator, Rawan Halawi.
