Written by: Hamad Ali
Posted on: January 15, 2020 | 
Zohair Zubair as Babar and Zain Qureshi as Gibran in The Waiters
Absurdist theatre responded to the destruction and anxieties of the 20th century by questioning the nature of reality and illusion. Largely based on the existential philosophy, absurdism was implemented by a small number of European playwrights. The term is derived from an essay by the French existential philosopher Albert Camus. In his 'Myth of Sisyphus', written in 1942, he first defined the human situation as absurd and devoid of meaning.
The 'absurd' plays by Samuel Beckett, Arthur Adamov, Eugene Ionesco, Jean Genet, Harold Pinter and others reveal the notion that man is occupying a universe with which he is out of key. Its meaning is indecipherable and his place within it is without reason. He is bewildered, bedeviled, and obscurely threatened.
The Waiters, an adaptation of Harold Pinter’s 1960 play called The Dumb Waiter, was performed at The Second Floor (T2F) on 12th January. Directed by Mazhar Noorani and Syed Muntazir, The Waiters is an absurd, tragicomic, one-act play. The plot revolves around two hitmen, Babar (played by Zohair Zubair) and Gibran (played by Zain Qureshi), who are waiting in a basement for a target to show up. The room is meagerly furnished with two beds and a few prop items, with an attached bathroom and kitchenette.
Babar and Gibran converse and bicker about news, sports, the snacks Gibran has brought, and a few shared memories. At one instance, an envelope with matches is slid under the door, but who put them there is unknown. Abruptly, about halfway through the play, the plot shifts as Gibran begins to receive intercom calls with requests for different foods, as if Gibran and Babar were running a restaurant kitchen. The men send up the food and drinks they have, only to receive more food requests.
The hitmen rehearse the murder they are about to commit. Gibran goes to the washroom for the umpteenth time. Answering a call on the intercom, Babar is ordered to shoot the first person who comes in the room. Babar points his gun at the door, ready to shoot, as Gibran enters the room from the bathroom. The two men stare at each other in terror.
Babar and Jibran
The play had its set of recurring motifs and symbols, which made this seemingly simple plot much more nuanced and absurdly layered with meanings. Gibran symbolized broken, one-sided communication. Throughout the act, Gibran and Babar never have an open dialogue, and whenever Gibran tries to bring up something emotional, Babar refuses to speak with him. This disconnection is the essence of their relationship. They do not speak with, but to each other. They are transporters of information, not sharers of it; thus, making their interactions meaningless.
According to the absurdist school of thought, life had no meaning and there is something deeply absurd about the human pursuit to find meaning. The dichotomy of Gibran and Babar’s broken communication and the audience’s quest to deliberate the characters’ dialogue, nails the absurdist brief.
Babar and Jibran Waiting for Orders
The matches are a motif of powerlessness. Babar wants Gibran to brew some tea for him, but there is no available gas. The men feel an illusion of power when they can light a match, but are thwarted at the hands of the unknown entity which sent the matches in the first place. The men can’t interpret the signal which the matches carry, a reminder that they are pawns in a rather sinister agenda.
The absurd expresses a fundamental disharmony and a tragic incompatibility in our existence. Camusian absurdity is the product of a confrontation between our human desire for order, meaning, and purpose in life and the blank, indifferent silence of the universe holding back on speaking the truths to placate the existential anxieties.
The actors Zohair and Zain acted seamlessly, delivering dialogue after another with perfect expressions and due comic timings. Mazhar and Muntazir, being cognizant of T2F’s space, directed the play in a triangular setting and one bright light maintaining the dramatic impact and a fresh outlook. An absurdist play, like The Waiters, delivered, causing major unease with its out of harmony, abrupt script and abstract symbols which needed an uninterrupted attention to make sense of it.
(L to R) Zain Qureshi, Mazhar Noorani, Asad, Syed Muntazir and Zohair Zubair
All photo credits go to Mazhar Noorani.
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