SAID Says Too Much, Not Enough

Marin Theatre Company’s new production, said SAID, piles riddles on enigmas, throws in some torture and a loaded pistol, arranges a face-off with old enemies, and does it all in the name of poetry. This west coast premiere is the creation of Kenneth Lin of Atlanta, where it was a prizewinner at that city’s Alliance Theatre. It was brought to MTC by Artistic Director, Jasson Minadakis, who directs the present production. Its Mill Valley appearance is only the second time this play has been produced.

Said SAID (sah-eed) follows three of the characters from their introduction in 1962, at the conclusion of the French-Algerian War, and carries them to 2002 in America, where a fourth character is added. Time shifts are dispersed throughout the play by means of blacked-out scene changes, but the revelation of events past and present discloses that the lead character, Andre Said, had been a doctor, poet and political prisoner in his native Algiers. He might have been a freedom fighter there. Or he might have been a terrorist. Now resettled in the United States, he has prospered mightily, becoming not only Poet Laureate, but also a Nobel Prizewinner. (Just accept this and keep going.)

Now an adoring female grad student pays him a visit requesting his help. She has brought photographs of the incised writing he left on the walls of his old prison cell in Algeria, and she’d like it translated. (Yes, she does have thoughts of publication.) Said will have none of it and seems entirely repelled by the prospect.

Back to 1962 Algeria, where Dr. Said’s French guard, Major Michel Garcet, is about to introduce him to the prison experience. There had been a bombing in the Casbah, Garcet says; another is expected, and he’s sure the doctor knows who did it. For most of the rest of this play, Garcet will continue trying to get his prisoner to talk.

But talking brings up a subliminal theme of the playwright’s: what happens to old languages? Said’s poetry had been in Arabic, his country’s dominant language, but he was a Berber. Was the message on the wall written in Berber, Algeria’s minority speech? Further, both Said and his French captor have become fluent in many languages, as has the Croatian-born grad student, Emily Allen. To her, Said reveals how he got his name, which wasn’t the original.

At this point in the play, the audience is baffled, but still captivated, because Miss Allen announces that the now-aged Michel Garcet is coming to the Said home. What will happen then? Surely all these questions will be resolved after Intermission.

But no; instead of resolution, new questions are thrown into the mix. Is Sarah, the poet’s middle-aged daughter, so testy and resentful because she was the real genius behind his Nobel prize? What is the now-frail Garcet doing in Vermont? Why has Said always insisted on dinner at 6:15, even when there was no food? What’s his obsession with turtles all about? And why doesn’t Emily just go away? Answers suggest themselves and then vanish into the wings. Viewer, beware: this play has more endings than The English Patient.

And much could have been avoided if, in the creation process, the playwright had recognized that said SAID is really a movie. Its multiple scene changes, costume switches, back-and-forth aging are easily accomplished with film. The blacked-out scene changes the play demands add nothing to the momentum, but add at least a half-hour to the length.

The actors, always superb at MTC, make the best of things. Jarion Monroe as Said is allowed only a few tender moments; much of the time, he must act out being tortured. Similarly, Delia MacDougall, who plays his daughter, Sarah, has a role with limited range until the play’s final, frenzied minutes. Danielle Levin portrays the determined scholar, Emily Allen, and Marvin Greene shows the torturer, Michel Garcet with a combination of menace and Gallic charm.

J. B. Wilson’s set, with its ever-present prisoner chair and prison walls, is another mystery. Chris Houston’s sound, however – including the calls from the Algerian mosque – is imaginative and helpful.

Said SAID squanders its strong beginning with too many add-ons. Kenneth Lin’s highly-charged script now needs scissors. And a camera.

Said SAID will be at the Marin Theatre Company, 397 Miller Avenue in Mill Valley, through February 24, every day but Monday. Tuesday through Saturday performances are at 8PM, Sunday’s are at 2PM and 7PM. For additional information, call the box office at 388-5208 or see the website, www. marintheatre.org.