TEHRAN-The Iranian play “Macbeth Zar” was performed at the Shakespeare Festival in Neuss, Germany, on Tuesday.

Written and directed by Ebrahim Poshtkoohi, the play is a production of the Titowak Theater Troupe, it is the only play from Asia participating in the event, IRNA reported.

In “Macbeth Zar,” the director has blended  the famous play by Shakespeare “Macbeth” with Zar, a rite commonplace in southern Iran.

“Macbeth” is one of Shakespeare's finest plays, and presents a man's conscience and the effect of guilt on his mind. A dark and bloody play, Macbeth explores reality and illusion; witchcraft and the supernatural; ambition and kingship; the natural order; light and life, darkness and death; blood and dead babies.

Shakespeare’s popular royal drama with its blood-soaked plot about guilt, lust for power and manipulation has always promised an intense theater experience. The supernatural magic and enchantment inherent in the plot provide an additional thrill. 

The mystical element of the story is the linchpin of Titowak Theater’s reading. It combines Shakespeare’s great tragedy about the Scottish tyrant Macbeth with the Zar ritual in the southern Iranian province of Hormozgan. 

Zar is the name for an evil spirit that is believed to possess people in the southern parts of Iran. In a Zar ritual, the possessed persons are freed from these spirits, which is associated with food and musical performances that culminate in ecstatic dances. 

Zar is a legacy from slavery as it was performed by African slaves who were brought to southern Iran. They performed it on weekends in order to gain energy to enable them to bear the burden of bondage for the rest of the week. Over time, ordinary people also joined in their musical rite comprising ecstatic dance with dammam (tom-tom) playing.

In Titowak’s reading, Macbeth lives on the rocky island of Hormoz in the Persian Gulf. Out of greed and a desire for recognition, he kills Duncan, the Zar’s master of ceremonies, in order to crown himself as the master of exorcisms.

Rarely has such a transcultural view been taken of a Shakespeare text. The western text encounters elements of Iranian, Arabic, Indian and African culture and brings a good dose of humor into play. The story of Macbeth serves as a template: Macbeth shakes our faith in human self-determination. What dark forces are simmering within us and who can ultimately save us from the abyss of our own souls?

Having earlier been staged in Tehran, the play was invited to the International Theatre Festival Rainbow in St. Petersburg, Russia last June and received a trophy as well. It also won the Jury prize of the 4th Baghdad International Theater Festival last October.

The cast includes Mojtaba Pirzadeh, Gata Abedi, Yashar Pournaderi, Fahimeh Mousavi Niyaraki, Matin Mokari Moghaddam, Seyed Javad Hosseini, Alireza Yaghoubi, Reza Khosrofar, and Mohammad Shokravi.

Shakespeare Festival in Germany is a part of the European Shakespeare Festivals Network (ESFN), which organizes similar festivals in Romania and Poland as well. This year’s edition of the festival started on May 4 and will run until May 25.

The ESFN brings together the key festivals across Europe who present Shakespeare from an international perspective. Its mission is to encourage collaboration across the various festivals, and to develop new opportunities and possibilities for theatre and performance makers who want to work with Shakespeare.

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