“‘Layalina’ has much to recommend: this first full production has vibrant characters, lots of funny family comedy, and a delightful performance from Becca Khalil,” writes Tribune critic ChrisJonesTrib.
Waseem Alzer, Ali Louis Bourzgui, Becca Khalil and Atra Asdou in Martin Yousif Zebari’s"Layalina."
The first act of Martin Yousif Zebari’s “Layalina” at the Goodman Theatre is set in Baghdad in March 2003, the month when then-President George W. Bush announced that U.S. forces had begun military operations in Iraq and just weeks before Iraqi civilians and U.S. soldiers pulled down a statue of Saddam Hussein in that city’s Firdos Square. The second act is set in 2020 on Church Street in Skokie.
Both acts, though, take place in a comfortable home despite the turmoil of the world outside. In essence, Zebari, whose own family emigrated from Iraq to the U.S., has penned a multigenerational family drama that explores many of the traditional themes of the genre, including the rebellion of young people from their parents’ traditional values and the slow acceptance of change by the crotchety oldsters.
The Black Lives Matter protests of 2020 smartly figure in, and the play begins to draw a parallel with what happened in Baghdad but it seems to drop that idea before fulfillment, and it felt to me like the writer had not yet figured out exactly what he wants to say there. The other issue is that given how the show takes place in Skokie, the action lacks the detail of everyday life: the audience loved any local references but there were few and they felt nonspecific.
You can tell how much Zebari loves their family from the writing and that ongoing openheartedness is one of this writer’s great strengths. Now they just have to work more on what could be a most compelling and moving story.
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