National Geographic Entertainment to release "Amreeka" beginning Sept. 4

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC ENTERTAINMENT TO RELEASE 'AMREEKA' IN US:
OPENS SEPT. 4 IN NEW YORK AND LOS ANGELES

Other Cities Around the U.S. Will Follow

LOS ANGELES (June 24, 2009)—National Geographic Entertainment (NGE) will release Cherien Dabis’ comedy “Amreeka” in New York and Los Angeles on Friday, Sept. 4, 2009, with a national rollout to follow. “Amreeka” premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, at New Directors/New Films (a co-presentation of The Museum of Modern Art and The Film Society of Lincoln Center) and in Directors Fortnight at the Cannes Film Festival, where it won the FIPRESCI prize.

“Amreeka” tells the adventures of Muna, an indomitable woman from the West Bank who moves to the promised land of small town Illinois with her teenage son, Fadi. In America, as her son navigates high school, Muna works hard and dreams of a new life. Nisreen Faour stars as Muna; Melkar Muallen plays her 16-year-old son. Also in the cast are Hiam Abbass, Alia Shawkat, Yussef Abu-Warda and Joseph Ziegler.

Written and directed by Dabis, “Amreeka” was produced by Christina Piovesan and Paul Barkin. Alicia Sams, Cherien Dabis and Greg Keever were executive producers; Liz Jarvis and Al-Zain Al-Sabah were co-producers.

This National Geographic Entertainment Presentation is a National Geographic/Imagenation Abu Dhabi Release in association with Levantine Entertainment, A First Generation Films Production, an Alcina Pictures/Buffalo Gal Pictures/Eagle Vision Media Group Production produced in association with Manitoba Film & Music, Rotana Studios and Showtime

Arabia.

Earlier in her career Dabis was a recipient of a 2007 National Geographic All Roads Film Project seed grant for her short film “Make a Wish.”

National Geographic Films President Adam Leipzig said, “‘Amreeka’ is a great culture clash comedy, and with it Cherien Dabis has announced herself as one of the great new talents in film. It is both funny and moving in its depiction of the hectic work it takes to attain the American dream. This international story is a perfect fit for National Geographic as we aspire to inspire people to care about our world. Since Cherien received one of the first National Geographic All Roads grants, working with her on ‘Amreeka’ is especially exciting.”

Dabis added, “While ‘Amreeka’ is a very personal film, it’s a universal story about family, the sacrifices we make for those we love and the often elusive search for belonging. I have no doubt that we’ve found the right home for it.”

(OVER)

AMREEKA (PAGE 2)

The release schedule for “Amreeka”:

Sept. 4 New York

Los Angeles

Sept. 18 Chicago

San Francisco

Detroit

Washington, D.C.

Boston

New York and Los Angeles: Check local listings for additional theaters Orange County, Calif.

Sept. 25 Philadelphia

Dallas

Houston

Austin

Seattle

Oct. 2 Miami

Orlando, Fla.

Jacksonville, Fla.

Portland, Ore.

Atlanta

San Diego

Albuquerque

Minneapolis

Please note, as with all films, dates are subject to change. Check local listings for theaters screening the film in each city.

For group sales info, go to amreekagroupsales@gmail.com. For more information about the film, visit www.amreeka.com.

About National Geographic Entertainment

National Geographic Entertainment (NGE) includes National Geographic Films (NGF) , which co-presented the 2005 Academy Award-winning “March of the Penguins” and 2004 Oscar-nominated film “The Story of the Weeping Camel,” and National Geographic Cinema Ventures (NGCV), which released both domestically and internationally the 3-D concert film “U2 3D” in 2008 to critical acclaim. NGCV set giant-screen box office records with “Mysteries of Egypt,” and recently with “Sea Monsters: A Prehistoric Adventure.” Adam Leipzig is president of NGF, Lisa Truitt is president of NGCV and Mark Katz is president of distribution of NGCV.

NGE combines into a single operating group National Geographic’s Cinema Ventures, Films, Kids Entertainment, Home Entertainment and Music & Radio. NGE is part of National Geographic Global Media, bringing together all of National Geographic’s editorial platforms in order to streamline collaboration and further support the Society's mission. Founded in 1888 to “increase and diffuse geographic knowledge,” National Geographic works to inspire people to care about the planet. It reaches more than 360 million people worldwide each month through magazines, books, digital media, television, radio, music and film. It funds more than 250 scientific research, exploration and conservation projects each year and supports an education program promoting geography literacy. For more information, visit www.nationalgeographic.com.

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Book Review: In Afghanistan: Two Hundred Years of British, Russian and American Occupation, David Loyn

What the World needs to know about Afghanistan?

Book Review: In Afghanistan: Two Hundred Years of British, Russian and American Occupation, David Loyn

By Aladdin Elaasar

Afghanistan is hotter than ever. As the fight against the Taliban is raging, this timely book is well-needed more than before. In Afghanistan: Two Hundred Years of British, Russian and American Occupation, veteran award-winning BBC foreign correspondent David Loyn brings an insider account about what is really happening there.

In this page turner, readers will get a first rate account into the history and the dynamics of politics in Afghanistan and struggle for the soul of this captivating, yet impoverished and devastated country.

From Alexander the Great to the Soviet Union failing miserably, Afghanistan has suffered through capitalism, communism, and the ferocious Taliban. Afghanistan proved to be the last straw, or the last nail in the coffin of many empires.

As the fight intensifies against the back-warded Taliban in both Afghanistan and Pakistan, the world is gasping for the end of the dark rule of the Taliban harboring the most dangerous terrorist organization, al-Qaida and its leaders bin-Laden and Zawahri.

From the Soviets eyeing it strategic location, to Jihadists who poured into this country with the blessings of many Arab regimes, the billions of petrodollars that found its way to the pockets of bin-Laden, and many other terrorists and warlords, Afghanistan has been the fighting grounds for many brutal proxy wars.

Now the war is heading into Afghanistan’s backyard, Pakistan on the verge of explosion, as its leadership and military have for years played a reluctant and dubious role in receiving Western and American aid, while turning a blind eye over the creeping of the Taliban, Wahabism, money laundering and grave human rights abuses.

From the comfortable Western armchair in an age of soap operas, reality TV, and sound-bites news, Westerns are mor e puzzled about what is happening in an area that seems incomprehensible.

In Afghanistan presents an eye-opening detailed account of who’s who in Afghanistan and what the struggle is all about. This highly-recommended book is a must-read for all of those hoping to understand and get a firsthand account of the story of this long-suffering nation; the exploitation of its women, men and children in refugee camps and poppy fields.

Aladdin Elaasar is author of “The Last Pharaoh: Mubarak and the Uncertain Future of Egypt in the Volatile Mid East” and Silent Victims: The Plight of Arabs and Muslims in Post 9/11 America. Elaasar has been a commentator on Middle Eastern affairs on American TV and Radio, and a media and cultural consultant. Email: omaraladin@aol.com

Arab American National Museum issues book awards

NEWS

Contact: Kim Silarski

313.624.0206

ksilarski@accesscommunity.org

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

2009 ARAB AMERICAN BOOK AWARD WINNERS SPOTLIGHT THE ARAB AMERICAN EXPERIENCE

Dearborn, MI (June 24, 2009) – Established American literary luminaries and compelling new voices inspired by global events are represented among the winners of the 2009 Arab American Book Award presented by the Arab American National Museum.
This national literary competition, the only one of its kind in the U.S., is designed to draw attention to books and authors dealing with the Arab American experience. The program has attracted increasing numbers of submissions in its three-year history and this year, a new award category was added for poetry.

Four winners emerged from the 35 books published during 2008 that were submitted for consideration; two honorable mentions were also selected, all by genre-specific review committees:

Winner - Fiction

A Map of Home: A Novel by Randa Jarrar

Winner - Non-Fiction

How Does It Feel to Be a Problem? Being Young and Arab in America by Moustafa Bayoumi
Winner - Poetry (new category this year)

breaking poems by Suheir Hammad
Winner - Children/Young Adult

Honeybee: Poems & Short Prose by Naomi Shihab Nye

Honorable Mentions (both Non-Fiction)

Encyclopedia of Arab American Artists: Artists of the American Mosaic by Fayeq Oweis and

Palestine Inside Out: An Everyday Occupation by Saree Makdisi

Descriptions of this year’s winning books and short biographies of their authors appear below. All of these titles are available for purchase in the Museum Store, while Museum Members may check out these titles free from the AANM Library & Resource Center.

An invitation-only gala award ceremony for the winning authors, publishers and their guests will be held at the Arab American National Museum on November 7, 2009.

Submissions are currently being accepted for the 2010 Arab American Book Award. Authors and publishers may call 313.624.0223 or email klalonde@accesscommunity.org for nomination forms and criteria.

The Arab American Book Award program encourages the publication and excellence of books that preserve and advance the understanding, knowledge, and resources of the Arab American community by celebrating the thoughts and lives of Arab Americans. The purpose of the Award is to inspire authors, educate readers and foster a respect and understanding of the Arab American culture.

The winning titles are chosen by groups of selected readers including respected authors, university professors, artists and AANM staff. The AANM first gave these awards in 2007 for books published in 2006.

*****************************
2009 Arab American Book Award Winners

(presented to books published in 2008)

Winner: Adult Fiction

A Map of Home: A Novel
By Randa Jarrar
Other Press

Funny, charming and heartbreaking, A Map of Home by Randa Jarrar is the kind of book Tristram Shandy or Huck Finn would have narrated had they been born Egyptian-Palestinian in the 1970s. The novel features Nidali, the rebellious daughter of an Egyptian-Greek mother and a Palestinian father, who narrates the story of her childhood in Kuwait, her teenage years in Egypt (to where she and her family fled the 1990 Iraq invasion), and her family’s last flight to Texas. Jarrar mixes humor with a sharp, loving portrait of an eccentric middle-class family with a daughter who endures several hardships throughout her life’s story, including the humiliation of going through a check point on a visit to her father’s home in the West Bank; the fights with her father, who wants her to become a famous professor and stay away from boys; the end of her childhood as Iraq invades Kuwait on her 13th birthday; and the scare she gives her family when she runs away from home.

Randa Jarrar grew up in Kuwait and moved to the U.S. after the first Gulf War. Her award-winning fiction has appeared in the Oxford American, Ploughshares, and numerous journals and anthologies. She is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Michigan, where this book won a Hopwood Award. She currently lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan. A Map of Home is her first novel.

Winner: Adult Non-Fiction

How Does It Feel to Be a Problem?: Being Young and Arab in America By Moustafa Bayoumi Penguin Press
How does it feel, to be a problem? W.E.B. Du Bois first posed this question in his seminal treatise The Souls of Black Folk, and now, over a century later, Moustafa Bayoumi explores the same question through the first-hand accounts of seven young Arab Americans living in Brooklyn. Their answers reveal the passions, frustrations, struggles, aspirations, and ultimately, the undeterred hope harbored by the inspiring young people featured in Bayoumi’s portraits. How Does It Feel to be a Problem? is an important and necessary book, in which Bayoumi’s subjects answer Du Bois’century-old question, just as they start to grasp how it feels to be a part of the solution.

Moustafa Bayoumi is coeditor of The Edward Said Reader and an associate professor of English at Brooklyn College, the City University of New York, where he lives. His writing has appeared in The Best Music Writing 2006, The Nation, The London Review of Books, and The Village Voice, among several other publications.

Winner: Children or Young Adult

Honeybee: Poems & Short Prose
By Naomi Shihab Nye
Greenwillow Books

Honey. Beeswax. Pollinate. Hive. Colony. Work. Dance. Communicate. Industrious. Buzz. Sting. Cooperate. Where would we be without them? Where would we be without one another? In 82 poems and paragraphs, Naomi Shihab Nye alights on the essentials of our time - our loved ones, our dense air, our wars, our memories, our planet - and leaves us feeling curiously sweeter and profoundly soothed.

Naomi Shihab Nye is a poet, essayist, and novelist. She has received a Lannan Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and four Pushcart Prizes. Her collection 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East was a finalist for the National Book Award. She is the author of two acclaimed novels for teens, Habibi and Going Going, and her essay "Maintenance" appeared in The Best American Essays, 1991, edited by Joyce Carol Oates. School Library Journal said of her collection of essays, Never in a Hurry, "The author has the ability to perceive and describe her surroundings so skillfully that readers are drawn into these experiences and are enriched in the process." Naomi Shihab Nye describes herself as "a wandering poet." She calls San Antonio, Texas, home.

Winner: Poetry

breaking poems
By Suheir Hammad
Cypher Books

In breaking poems Suheir Hammad departs from her previous books with a bold and explosive style to do what the best poets have always done: create a new language. Using "break" as a trigger for every poem, Hammad destructs, constructs, and reconstructs the English language for us to hear the sound of a breath, a woman's body, a land, a culture, falling apart, broken, and put back together again.

Suheir Hammad’s work has appeared in dozens of anthologies and numerous publications. She was a co-writer and original cast member in the Tony-award winning Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry Jam on Broadway. An Amherst College Aaron Copeland Fellow, she stars in the movie Salt of this Sea. The author of Born Palestinian, Born Black; Drops of This Story and Zataar Diva, Suheir has won several awards for her writing, including The Audre Lorde Poetry Award, a Van Lier Fellowship and a Sister of Fire Award.

2008 Honorable Mentions

Honorable Mention: Non-Fiction

Encyclopedia of Arab American Artists: Artists of the American Mosaic By Fayeq Oweis Greenwood Press

The Encyclopedia of Arab American Artists is an exceptional volume of reference that focuses on the contribution of Arab American artists across the mediums. The book includes profiles and interviews of well known Arab American artists that have been featured in museums and galleries throughout the world, but have never before been featured in a reference book. Whether they be in traditional media such as painting and calligraphy, or more sophisticated media such as digital work and installation, the pieces highlighted in the Encyclopedia of Arab American Artists represent the rich culture of Arab Americans which attempt to capture the beauty of heritage, the struggles of growing up in war-torn countries, the identity conflicts of female artists in male-dominated societies, and the issues surrounding migration to a Western culture very different from one's own.

Fayeq Oweis is an Arab American artist and a professor of Arabic language and culture at Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, California. He has a Ph.D. in interdisciplinary studies with a focus on Arabic and Islamic arts. As an artist, he designed the exterior entranceway murals and the calligraphy of the dome interior of the Arab American National Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. He has also exhibited his Arabic calligraphic compositions throughout the United States and was an artist-in-residence at the Art Institute of Chicago in February 2007.

Honorable Mention: Non-Fiction

Palestine Inside Out: An Everyday Occupation By Saree Makdisi W.W. Norton

Palestine Inside Out by Saree Makidisi depicts the day to day life of Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank, and their often shocking existence under Israeli control. Through eye-opening statistics and day-by-day reports, Makdisi shows how Palestinians have seen their hopes for freedom and statehood culminate in the creation of abject “territories” comparable to open-air prisons. In devastating detail, Palestine Inside Out reveals how the “peace process” institutionalized Palestinians’ loss of control over their inner and outer lives.

Saree Makdisi is a professor of English and comparative literature at UCLA. He lives in Los Angeles, California.

******
The Arab American National Museum documents, preserves, celebrates, and educates the public on the history, life, culture, and contributions of Arab Americans. It serves as a resource to enhance knowledge and understanding about Arab Americans and their presence in this country. The Arab American National Museum is a project of ACCESS, a Dearborn, Michigan-based nonprofit human services and cultural organization. Learn more at www.arabamericanmuseum.org and www.accesscommunity.org .

The Arab American National Museum is a proud Affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. Read about the Affiliations program at http://affiliations.si.edu .

The Museum is located at 13624 Michigan Avenue, Dearborn, MI, 48126. Museum hours: 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday; noon-5 p.m. Sunday. Closed Monday, Tuesday; Thanksgiving, Christmas Day and New Year’s Day. Admission is $6 for adults; $3 for students, seniors and children 6-12; ages 5 and under, free. Call 313.582.2266 for further information.

###

"Under the Cover of War" -- the Palestinian Nakba

60 years since Al-Nakba (the Catastrophe) of 1948
Arabicus Books & Media presents an important new book.

Under the Cover of War
The Zionist Expulsion of the Palestinians

Rosemarie M. Esber

“Helps to balance documentation and diaries by one side . . . the suffering of those
who fled is all too evident.” -- Robert Fisk, The Independent

Ø Under the Cover of War explains in detail how the Jewish Agency used the cover of war to expel more than 400,000 Palestinian men, women and children from some 220 villages, towns, and cities before May 15, 1948 when the British relinquished the Palestine mandate and Israel became a state.

Ø Incorporates a Palestinian narrative of their expulsions by including some 130 new interviews with refugees from Jordan, Lebanon, and the United States.

Ø Provides an invaluable case study for U.S. military planners on how not to end a military occupation by describing how the scuttled British withdrawal from Palestine, in just six months, contributed to civil war and the creation of Palestinian refugees.

A MUST READ FOR THE MILITARY!
“I am more convinced than ever after reading this we need more attention to the problems in this region to have any kind of peace in the future.” -- Jerzee Devil

Watch the You Tube Trailer: http://youtube.com/watch?v=pUEq9GgS4F4
Robert Fisk, The Independent:
Under the Cover of War “helps to balance documentation and diaries by one side with verbal recollection on the other. The book does not spare the Arabs—least of all the Arab atrocities or the Iraqi volunteers who turned up to fight for Palestine but didn't even know their geography—yet the suffering of those who fled is all too evident.”

“Here for example, is Abu Mohamed from the village of Saqiya, east of Tel Aviv describing what happened on 25 April, 1948: ‘Jews entered the village and started shooting women, men, and old people. They arrested girls, and we still don't know what happened to them. They came from the settlement that was near the village. They used Bren guns. Then armoured vehicles entered the centre of the village. Fourteen were killed that day. Two women could not run so they were killed in the village. The villagers ran together in the direction of al-Lid (Lod, the site of Ben Gurion airport in Israel today). After that, families started to leave separately. We left everything in the village. We thought it would be a short trip and we would come back.’”

Publishers Weekly, web pick of the week 11/24/08:

In her first effort, researcher and writer Esber takes readers on a dramatic inquest of modern Israel’s beginnings and the Arab conflict over Palestine. Reviewing historical accounts, Esber reveals that after WWII many of Europe's expelled Jews sought to regain their roots in Palestine. This meant the expulsion of the Palestinian Arab community who lived there; with the tacit approval of the United Nations, Palestinians were cruelly evicted from their homes and lives, subject to demonization and, according to Esber, a campaign of ethnic cleansing. Esber’s account abounds with first hand accounts from Arab victims recounting the terror they faced at the hands of Zionist forces. This gripping historical account illuminates the plight of Palestinians following the War, too long overshadowed in the media and historical record by the atrocity of the Holocaust; placing them back to back, Esber demonstrates a tragic domino effect, in which victims become aggressors and survival becomes a matter of fighting back.

Order online from Amazon and Barnes & Noble

Under the Cover of War is an important resource for anyone seeking to understand the full story of the 1948 Palestine war and the roots of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Rosemarie Esber meticulously documents and poignantly recounts the first phase of the Zionist conquest of Palestine and the expulsion of the indigenous Palestinians—an estimated 84 percent were children under 15, pregnant and nursing mothers, the elderly, and the infirm.
As this compelling history shows, the human tragedy of Palestine’s ethnic cleansing entailed the demonization of the Palestinian Arabs, the incitement of violence by Jewish nationalist leaders, and a weak response from an apathetic international community. War provided a cover for systematic expulsions and the founding of the State of Israel on Palestinian land, while British colonial officials did little but watch.

An array of unpublished military and diplomatic sources supports the Palestinians’ own account of their Nakba (catastrophe or disaster), based on new, original refugee interviews. This little-known story of human suffering makes a convincing case that redressing Palestinian losses is vital for regional and world peace.

The author, Rosemarie M. Esber, Ph.D., is a researcher and writer with degrees from the University of London and The Johns Hopkins University.

For Immediate Release
ISBN: 978-0-9815131-7-1
Hardback, 440 pages, 40 illustrations, appendices,
bibliography, index, $29.95

Media Contact
Arabicus Books & Media, LLC
(703) 585-3463
arabicusbooks@aol.com
www.ArabicusBooks.com

New Arab American humor book released

**FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE**
EDITORS: For review copies or
interview requests, contact:
Dalel Khalil
Tel: 412-680-9094
Email: v2tchick@dalelkhalil.com
Website: www.dalelkhalil.com


HILARIOUS NEW BOOK BY PITT ALUMNA OPENS WINDOW OF UNDERSTANDING TO THE ARAB WORLD

Tossed into a world of extreme contradictions…what’s a girl to do?

PITTSBURGH - A hilarious new book—the first of its kind—by Arab-American and native Pittsburgher, Dalel B. Khalil, examines with humor and candor the stark differences between the Arab and American cultures. Using insightful, sharp humor to tackle sensitive cultural issues and foster cross-cultural understanding, Khalil comically instructs how to retain one’s sanity in the battle of the ultimate culture clash.
Arabic women deal with very serious issues which they often feel powerless to change. Western women, on the other hand, are raised to be extremely assertive and fight for their rights. So...one who is both Arab and American is very often, very confused. She’s got one foot planted firmly in a traditional world whose cultural rules haven’t changed in over 2,000 years, while her other foot is skidding on a thin piece of ice, the mega liberal free-for-all called America. And she’s trying to balance, walking on both.
This lighthearted survival guide takes its Western readers on a fun-filled journey inside the “kooky” minds of those mysterious people, and offers hilarious explanations as to why we have absurd cultural rules such as arranged marriages, and why Hip-Hop has its roots in the streets of Damascus.
FROM VEILS TO THONGS: An Arab Chick’s Survival Guide to Balancing One’s Ethnic Identity in America comes at a time when the international climate is causing Americans to want to learn more about Eastern cultures, giving them a new and realistic reference point of what the average “Arab chick” is all about. Not limited to Arab-Americans, and not about religion or politics, FROM VEILS TO THONGS will interest anyone who is curious about other cultures, as well as those foreigners who left their “traditional” culture to live and make a new life in a “liberal” one.

About the Author
Dalel B. Khalil is a Syrian-American who survived growing up in the crossfire of two of the most diametrically opposed cultures—the East and the West. She has worked as a reporter, anchor, talk show host and morning show co-host for three of Pittsburgh's top radio stations, (WDVE, WAMO, KDKA). This is her first book.

Visit the author's Web site at http://www.dalelkhalil.com

From Veils to Thongs:
An Arab Chick's Survival Guide to Balancing One's Ethnic Identity

Available at:

iUniverse.com ,
bn.com , and Amazon.com

HBO documentary on transexuals in Iran coming up in May

HBO DOCUMENTARIES

presents

BE LIKE OTHERS

A film by Tanaz Eshaghian

Premieres May 20, 2009


In the Islamic Republic of Iran, a country with strict social mores and traditional values, sex-change operations are legal. Over twenty years ago, Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa (religious edict) making sex change permissible for “diagnosed transsexuals.” Yet homosexuality is still punishable by death.

With Iran’s international arms negotiations dominating news headlines worldwide, a very private kind of drama is unfolding behind the scenes. Highly feminine and attracted to members of the same sex, yet forced to live in secret for fear of retribution, a generation of young Iranian men are adopting an identity legally allowed to them—transsexual. In pursuit of what one man calls simply, “a decent life,” they flock to the country’s best-established gender reassignment surgeon, Dr. Bahram Mir Jalali, and are counseled by 24-year-old Vida, a post-op woman who claims to be “reborn” but warns of dangers that still await.

Iranian-American filmmaker Tanaz Eshaghian accompanies several young men as they contemplate and prepare for their transformation, then follows them into and out of surgery. Intimate and unflinching, BE LIKE OTHERS is a fascinating look at those on the fringes of Iranian life—those looking for acceptance through the most radical of means.

About Tanaz Eshagian:
Tanaz Eshaghian was born in Iran in 1974 and left with her mother at the age of six, at the start of the Iran-Iraq war. She grew up in New York City, where she still lives, and graduated from Brown University in 1996 with a BA in Art Semiotics. Tanaz began making films a few years later, with a focus on documenting the Iranian experience in America. In 2001 she made the short documentary I CALL MYSELF PERSIAN. Framed by the Iran hostage crisis of 1979 and the World Trade Center attacks, the film reveals how Iranians living in the U.S. are often stereotyped and held responsible for anti-American activity, and weighs the effects on their identity. Her second film, the 63-minute LOVE IRANIAN-AMERICAN STYLE (2005), was shot over a period of four years and documented her own traditional Iranian family’s obsession with marrying her off. Sexual purity, money and a mother’s worries come together in this humorous guided tour lead by Tanaz through the Iranian-Jewish communities in New York and Los Angeles. BE LIKE OTHERS is her first film set in Iran—a country she had not visited for decades.

TO REQUEST AN INTERVIEW WITH TANAZ ESHAGIAN
OR A SCREENER OF THIS FILM, PLEASE CONTACT:
Lauren Schwartz
Donna Daniels Public Relations, LLC
20 West 22nd Street, Suite 1410
New York, NY 10010

Arab-Israeli conflict focus of Chciago theatrical play

“THE ARAB-ISRAELI COOKBOOK”

Theatre Mir gives voice to the Arab-Israeli conflict
in theatrical production and special programs

at the Chicago DCA Storefront Theater
March 5 – April 5, 2009

Theatre Mir, in association with Chicago DCA Theater, presents the Midwest premiere of The Arab-Israeli Cookbook by British playwright Robin Soans. The production comes to Chicago DCA Theater’s Storefront Theater at 66 E. Randolph Street, from March 5 through April 5, 2009. Members of the press are invited to the opening performance on Saturday, March 7, at 7:30 p.m.

The Arab-Israeli Cookbook brings Arab and Israeli voices together in the stories of ordinary people living in a rich yet divided world in Israel and the West Bank. Based on real-life interviews, this deeply human play weaves the stories and recipes of more than forty characters who reveal common culture and experiences amidst the daily conflict. In restaurants, shops, cafes, and homes, everyone has a story to tell and a recipe to cook.

In 2003, playwright Robin Soans and directors Rima Brihi and Tim Roseman – the one Arab, the other Jewish – traveled to Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza. The play was originally presented in a hit production at London’s The Gate Theatre. It has since been produced in Canada, Japan, and the United Stated and broadcast on BBC World Service in 2006. Theatre Mir’s production is the play’s Midwest premiere.

Performances are Thursday, Friday, and Saturday evenings at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday afternoons at 3:00 p.m. Tickets are $23 for general admission, $18 for seniors, and $15 for students. Discounts are also available for groups of ten or more. All tickets are available by calling 312.742.TIXS (8497), visiting www.dcatheater.org, or stopping by the box office, open Tuesday through Saturday, noon to 6 p.m.; Sundays, noon to 4 p.m.; and one hour prior to each performance. Post-show discussions moderated by Scott Hibbard and Khalil Marrar of the DePaul University Political Science Department will follow the preview performances on March 5 and 6.



Cast and Production Team
Cast
Walter Brody, Maggie Cain, Susaan Jamshidi, Stephen Loch, Julian Martinez, Mark Richard, Frank Sawa, and Rachel Slavick.

Production Team
Rob Chambers (Director), Marianna Csaszar (Sets), Brandon Wardell (Lights), Laura B. Kollar (Costumes), Brett Masteller (Sound), Christina Pretsch and Chris Chapin (Stage Managers), Eva Breneman (Dialects), Zev Valancy (Dramaturgy), Andrea Fears (Assistant Director), Danica Ivancevic (Producer).

Special Events
In association with the production, Theatre Mir and Chicago DCA Theater will present a series of special events designed to further explore the themes and issues raised in The Arab-Israeli Cookbook.

Monday, March 16, 7pm
Discussion “Staging Conflict: Theatrical Narratives of the Holy Land”
Claudia Cassidy Theater, Chicago Cultural Center
FREE, Reservations encouraged at 312.742.TIXS (8497), or at www.dcatheater.org
Silk Road Theatre Project and Theatre Mir present scenes from their productions of Motti Lerner’s “Pangs of the Messiah” and Robin Soans’ “The Arab-Israeli Cookbook,” two plays portraying unique perspectives on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: the former an intra-Jewish story about a family of religious West Bank settlers set in 2012 and the latter a verbatim play based on interviews with Christians, Jews and Muslims living in Israel and the West Bank. The program includes a lively panel discussion on the challenges of dramatizing the personal and political within the context of the Middle East.

Wednesday, April 1, 6:30pm
Film Screening “Encounter Point”
Claudia Cassidy Theater, Chicago Cultural Center
FREE, Reservations encouraged at 312.742.TIXS (8497), or at www.dcatheater.org
“Encounter Point” is a poignant documentary about a former Israeli settler, a Palestinian ex-prisoner, a bereaved Israeli mother and a wounded Palestinian bereaved brother who risk their lives and public standing to promote a nonviolent end to the conflict. Their journeys lead them to the unlikeliest places to confront hatred within their communities. The film explores what drives them and thousands of other like-minded civilians to overcome anger and grief to work for grassroots solutions in the face of government inaction. It is a film about the everyday leaders in our midst.

Saturday, April 4, 11am
World Kitchen Class “The Arab-Israeli Cookbook”
Gallery 37 Center for the Arts, 66 E. Randolph
$30, Tickets go on sale Wednesday, March 4 at 12 noon
The Department of Cultural Affairs’ World Kitchen offers this special hands-on cooking class that brings some of The Arab-Israeli Cookbook’s Middle Eastern recipes into your home kitchen. Students must be 16 years or older. Tickets can be purchased at Chicago DCA Theater’s box office, at 312.742.TIXS (8497), or at www.dcatheater.org

Theatre Mir was created in 2007 to actively engage audiences about issues affecting our world today – to entertain as well as to inform. Inspired by the Russian word “mir”, which means both peace and world, Theatre Mir's mission is to create opportunities through entertainment and related education programs for artists and audiences to explore issues facing our multi-ethnic and multi-cultural society and world today. The company presented a production of “The Prisoner’s Dilemma” in 2008 at the Raven Theatre. More information on Theatre Mir can be found at www.theatremir.com.

The Storefront Theater and the Studio Theater, its companion theater located in the Chicago Cultural Center at 77 E. Randolph Street, comprise Chicago DCA Theater, an anchor of the downtown theater district. Chicago DCA Theater offers downtown audiences an off-Loop theater experience with an exciting look at the vibrant emerging and developing theater companies that call Chicago home. Proposals for creative and innovative productions for the January to June 2010 season are now being accepted until May 15, 2009.

Discounted parking is available at Wabash Randolph Self Park at 20 E. Randolph. Patrons can receive the $14 rate by validating their ticket at the Storefront Theater box office.

For more information about Theatre Mir’s The Arab-Israeli Cookbook and Chicago DCA Theater, visit call 312.742.TIXS (8497) or visit www.dcatheater.org. The enhanced website features more information about DCA Theater performances and programs, including a blog, photo galleries, and visitor information.

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Note to Press: Electronic images are available at www.dcatheater.org/press or by request.