TEHRAN-Sanaz Toossi's Pulitzer Prize-winning play “English” will receive its European premiere in England in May.

It will be performed at The Other Place in Stratford-upon-Avon, 146 km north-west of London, from May 9 to June 1 before heading to the Kiln Theater in London from June 5 to June 29, Mehr reported on Friday.

Directed by Diyan Zora, the play tells the story of four adult Iranian classmates who grapple with learning English as a foreign language. However, they realize that there is more to their lives than can ever be uttered through language.

The quietly powerful play depicts the four people preparing for an English language exam in a storefront school near Tehran, where family separations and travel restrictions drive them to learn a new language that may alter their identities and also represent a new life.

The story happens in 2008, and four Iranians assemble triweekly in a TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language) class in Karaj. The students are led by Marjan, an anglophile who abolishes Farsi from her classroom. They translate English songs and endure major preposition confusion; they discover how to be funny in English and ponder what they will lose in the process. 

Navigating word games and listening exercises, the students make every effort to become fluent enough to migrate abroad to pursue their disparate goals—one hopes to reunite with her Canadian son, another wishes to pursue medical school in Australia. All feel a tension between their Iranian homeland and their hoped-for future. As the class slowly devolves into a linguistic mess, some students cling tighter to their mother tongue while others embrace the possibilities of a new language.

The play examines what is lost and what is gained in the acquisition of a foreign language upon which so much opportunity depends. For these characters, the study of English isn’t merely an elective chosen to broaden their knowledge of the world or enhance an upcoming trip. It is the key to their future.

“English” earns an audience’s goodwill. The humanity of the characters — their fears and dreams, how they feel about the future — is revealed through humor and pathos that coexist as matter-of-factly as parts of grammar.

Nadia Albina, Lanna Joffrey, Sara Hazemi, and Serena Manteghi will act in the comic and deeply moving play by Toossi, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2023. 

Toossi is an Iranian-American playwright and screenwriter. She graduated from the Tisch School of the Arts in 2018, having previously received her bachelor's degree from the University of California, Santa Barbara. Her plays are drawn from personal experience and the experiences of her family. 

“English” also received the Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Play in 2022. In the same year, she received the Horton Foote Award from the Dramatists Guild of America and also the award for Best New American Play by the Obie Awards.

SS/SAB