Hossein Fassa’s Director’s Note
I have often been excited and transfixed by the magical communal aspect of the theatre mostly because it entails the delicate, intricate process of the communing of a group of nomadic folks with vastly disparate backgrounds yet a shared common goal: to bring ideas to life with themselves as the instruments. It was a tremendous honor to work with such expressive performers comprising of veteran thespian talents and some emerging young actors who poured themselves into giving life to Sophia Romma’s unearthly lyrical words. It was thrilling to see this troupe of actors paint such a full fleshed-out scenic allegorical portrait in a very short space of time. One of the sheer joys of working with an author of such breadth of literary references, namely, political, farcical, biblical, lyrical, and satirical is the myriad of possibilities and levels of interpretation that the work presents the audience with. The danger is always that the director may force his or her interpretation upon such a unique voice, at the risk of diminishing the eleven dimensional multiverse that the piece may work on. Good plays gift us with markers to steer us in the right artistic direction. Sophia’s play, “The Blacklist” provides us with so much more. There is a real rhythm to her work, an underlying score. It may not be immediately obvious on a casual read through the play, but when voiced by gifted performers it becomes a veritable guide. I thank Sophia Romma for her immense passion and for this one of a kind meaningful, impactful avant-garde experience as a director of the theatre. Sophia’s drama is a twisted distorted mirror of turbulent life. She draws amply from the faults and weaknesses of mankind and expresses her dialogue in bold language which surpasses mere beauty—her verse is the language of the Gods that blossoms with the depth of truth which solely noble art may attempt to echo in earnest. Sophia has tapped into the issues which haunt all of us in contemporary times. She presents these issues in this play as fundamental ones. We shall be grappling with these dilemmas today and perhaps for centuries to come. In essence, Ms. Romma’s play is rather universal and unapologetically eternal.
Hossein Fassa’s Brief Biography
Hossein Fassa is an actor, director, producer and former director of the Stella Adler Conservatory of Acting in New York City. As an actor, Mr. Fassa studied with Stella Adler and has performed at La Mama Experimental Theatre Club, Theater for the New City, Broome Street Theater, Tribeca Lab (where he served as a founding member) and at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Edinburgh, Scotland. He has directed works by Howard Barker, Yukio Mishima and a slew of new playwrights at theatre venues across New York City and at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Hossein Fassa