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*West Coast Premiere*

Language Rooms

written by Yussef el Guindi
directed by Evren Odcikin

November 10 to December 4, 2011
Thick House, San Francisco

In LANGUAGE ROOMS (which won the Edgerton Foundation New American Play Award in 2010), Ahmed is a shining example of the American Dream, working as a translator in a Homeland Security detainment facility. His workplace “frenemy” Nasser, a Muslim of Asian descent, soon brings him some bad news—that his loyalties are being called into question. As office politics take a turn for the absurd all around him, Ahmed realizes that much more than just his job hangs in the balance.

LANGUAGE ROOMS is an unexpected juxtaposition of a comical political thriller and an American immigrant family story. It specifically looks at the question of ‘home’ and ‘fitting in’ from the persective of Arab Americans and Asian American Muslims, but the issues it raises and the stereotypes it skewers are universal to every American’s experience. El Guindi explains further: “The wonderful optimism of this country, the propulsion to keep going, to reinvent, that weightlessness, the acceptance that you can change your name, your history, kick your past to the curb as you gun for a new beginning, I think all those good things end up gutting you of a center, a wholeness. What becomes of your touchstones, your anchor, your story, after you leave so much behind?  Who are you when you’re always in flux?”

(Originally developed at ACT Theatre, Seattle, WA. Further developed by New York Stage and Film Company and The Powerhouse Theater in a reading at Vassar on June 29, 2009. The World Premiere of LANGUAGE ROOMS was produced by The Wilma Theater.)

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Featuring: Mujahid Abdul-Rashid*, James Asher*, William Dao, Terry Lamb*

Design Team: Miyuki Bierlein, Alan Chang, Valerie M. Niles, Darl Andrew Packard, Mikiko Uesugi*, Huy Vu

Production Team: Karen Runk*, Aaron Niles, Lannie Gower, Wan-Yin Tang

*Member Actors Equity Association, United Scenic Artists

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Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays at 8:00 PM | Sundays at 7:00 PM

(No Performances on Nov 13 and Nov 24)

General Admission $28 | Students, Seniors, TBA $20 | Previews & Thursdays – Pay What You Can at the door, $20 in advance

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Thick House 1695 18th Street, San Francisco, CA 94107
Purchase your tickets online or thru the Thick House Box Office: (415) 913-7366