December 1–December 23, 2016
The World Premiere
Written and Performed by Christine Bunuan
Directed by J.R. Sullivan
Musical Direction by Ryan Brewster
This new holiday musical revue puts a Silk Road spin on the Christmas season. Chicago favorite Christine Bunuan invites you into her world with Christmas at Christine's. Journey from California to Chicago to the Philippines to a Catholic-Jewish household as Christine sings her way through the holiday songbook and a lifetime of yuletide memories.
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Read MoreSo he won the election. Shock, fear, and anger morph into responses, both coherent and otherwise. And yet, while heartbreak overwhelms, clarity and renewed focus emerge as its natural counterweights...
Read MoreStage and Cinema
By Lawrence Bommer
September 9, 2016
Facing daily presumptions of guilt that demand constant proofs of innocence (and not just at airports), Usman has developed a survival philosophy, a self-detachment that doubles as a plea for tolerance or at least sanity.
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Read MoreEdge Media Network
By Becky Sarwate
Thursday Sep 8, 2016
Silk Road Rising is doing something unique and exciting on the Chicago theater landscape.
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Read MoreNewcity Stage Chicago
By Irene Hsiao
September 8, 2016
...It’s calculated: How he moves his eyes, the stool, the mike. Every accent and syllable walks the line between entertainment and disclosure. Recommended!
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Read MoreSeptember 06–September 25, 2016
The World Premiere
Written and Performed by Azhar Usman
Directed by Aaron Todd Douglas
Famed comedian, Azhar Usman, takes to the stage with this brutally honest, unflinching one-man show exploring the tensions and paradoxes surrounding the double consciousness of American Muslims living in an ever-polarizing modern world.
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Read MoreWritten by Jamil Khoury with Dr. Manal Hamzeh
Directed by Liz Wuerffel
Animated by Anna Hayden-Roy
July 30, 2016
"The Four Hijabs" is an animated short film that explores the multiple meanings of four hijabs mentioned in 16 Qur'anic verses and interprets them through Arab Muslim feminist lenses.
Read MoreJuly 9–10, 2016
Written by Nahal Navidar
Directed by Azar Kazemi
Indian summer delivers hope and light on a gorgeous morning in Brooklyn Heights.
Nasrin, an Iranian American PhD student, and Donovan, an elevator repairman, plan for a bright future together. But when explosions from the other side of the Hudson shake their world, the ashes of fear and hatred quietly creep in and haunt Donovan’s mind. In a post 9/11 xenophobic environment where intolerance is the new status-quo, the couple find themselves questioning whether they will survive the fall.
Read MoreOmar Mateen made me gay. Well, not “made,” that honor belongs to God. But the homophobic mass murder Mateen committed on June 12, 2016, at Pulse, a popular LGBTQ nightclub in Orlando, Florida, reintroduced me and many others I know to earlier versions of our gay selves...
Read MoreMarch 24–May 15, 2016
The World Premiere
Written by Jamil Khoury
Directed by Edward Torres
Inspired by the “Ground Zero Mosque” controversy in New York City, Mosque Alert tells the story of three fictional families living in Naperville, Illinois, whose lives are interrupted by a proposed Islamic Center on the site of a beloved local landmark. Mosque Alert explores the intersections of zoning and Islamophobia with humor, family drama, and refreshingly blunt honesty.
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Read MoreWritten and Directed by Jamil Khoury
March 28, 2013
"Meet Mosque Alert" is a compilation of content created in Steps 1 through 4 of Jamil Khoury's 9-Step new play development and civic engagement process. Mosque Alert tells the story of two suburban American families living in Naperville, IL—one Christian, the other Muslim—who find their lives torn apart by a proposal to build a new mosque in their community.
Read MoreFebruary 18–February 28, 2016
The World Premiere
Written and Performed by Ronnie Malley
Directed by Anna C. Bahow
Take an enchanting musical journey to 9th century Islamic Spain with Muslim American musical impresario Ronnie Malley. Arabic music, poetry, and songs breathe life into the story of Ziryab, a former slave whose musical abilities brought him fame throughout Al-Andalus: a land where Christians, Jews and Muslims co-existed for more than seven centuries and created a unique and diverse society.
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Read MoreFebruary 8, 2016
Hamlet was first performed in Egypt around 1893 as a historical romance in which Hamlet defeats his uncle, and reigns with the Ghost’s blessing. “Culturally transplanted” Shakespeare has a lengthy performance history in the Middle East, especially among the educated elite. Yet how is Shakespeare connecting today to a broader Middle Eastern audience?
Read MoreJanuary 30–31, 2016
Written by Amir Nizar Zuabi
Directed by Anna C. Bahow
They came from Damascus, from Aleppo, from Banias—where bombs fall day and night and wounded children look like sleeping angels. Now they live in camps and abandoned buildings in Lebanon and Jordan, as Syria becomes a haunting memory.
A Syrian woman prepares kibbeh in her kitchen, while recounting tales of her vanished lover. Her stories bring to life an ancient land torn apart by a cruel war. Oh My Sweet Land is written by Amir Nizar Zuabi, rising star of the Palestinian theatre.
Read MoreModerated by Jamil Khoury
Featuring Mark Daniel, Tony Michelassi, and Phil Robertson
January 19, 2016
The panel discussion Panic Intersecting: Mosques, Zoning, and Islamophobia was held at Silk Road Rising on Tuesday, January 19, 2016. The panel featured zoning specialist and attorney Mark Daniel, DuPage County Board Member Tony Michelassi, and Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Chicago) Trial Attorney Phil Robertson. Moderated by Artistic Director Jamil Khoury, the panelists discussed their experiences with mosque zoning disputes in the Chicagoland area and the motivations behind them. This event created a broader understanding of the difficulties facing the Muslim American community in their wish to exercise their religious freedom and provided more context for our upcoming world premiere of Jamil Khoury’s Mosque Alert.
Read More2016 - Present
Arab and Muslim voices are far too seldom heard in the American theatre. Often when they are, it’s in service to affirming worst fears and stereotypes. As an antidote to this crisis of representation, we established Crescent and Star, an initiative grounded in our commitments to commissioning new plays and supporting Arab American and Muslim American playwrights. Creating complicated, three dimensional stories informed by personal experiences of identity, community, tradition, and faith, is the primary goal. For when Arab and Muslim artists have a forum to explore the challenges and complexities of their lives, the seeds for change are inevitably sown.
Read MoreNovember 19–22, 2015
A Workshop Production
Written and Performed by Jameeleh Shelo
Directed by Jessica Mitolo
Through a diverse group of characters, this sketch comedy show offers a lovable view into the life of a Middle Eastern American woman from the South Side of Chicago as she navigates her way through cultural pressures and societal assumptions. What happens when the Mid-East meets the Mid-West? The answers will fill you with laughter and joy!
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Read MoreThe 2015-16 theatre season represents a first in American theatre history. A play written by a Muslim American playwright of Pakistani heritage will receive more productions nationwide than any other play. In fact, Ayad Akhtar’s Disgraced is the first play ever to feature a Muslim protagonist (apostate or otherwise) to have garnered this level of attention and acclaim. From Chicago’s American Theatre Company, to Lincoln Center, to London’s West End, to Broadway, to a Tony nomination, to scheduled productions at over 50 U.S. theatre companies, to an HBO film deal, to foreign language translations, Disgraced has become nothing short of an international phenomenon. And yet, the play’s resounding success begs an obvious question: Why is a play that affirms so many popular fears about Muslims the toast of the American theatre season?
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