美国国家公共电台 NPR Broadway's 'The Band's Visit' Tells A Story Of Common Ground Between Cultures

 

SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

David Yazbek's mother is Jewish, his father Lebanese. In his newest Broadway musical, "The Band Visit," (ph) Mr. Yazbek wanted to write about the meeting of those two cultures. And as Jeff Lunden reports, his show focuses on the commonality not the clash.

JEFF LUNDEN, BYLINE¹: It all started when a producer contacted David Yazbek about adapting a 10-year-old Israeli movie for the stage. "The Band's Visit" is about an Egyptian police band stranded² by mistake in a town in the middle of the Israeli desert.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "WELCOME TO NOWHERE")

KATRINA LENK: (Singing) Stick a pin in a map of the desert. Build a road to the middle of the desert. Pour cement on the spot in the desert. That's Bet Hatikvah. Welcome to nowhere.

LUNDEN: When the townspeople discover the musicians are stuck for the night, they invite them into their homes. And that's pretty much the plot. Yazbek says the musical follows the film's lead in dramatizing...

DAVID YAZBEK: The tensions between Israel and the Arab countries without overtly³ dealing⁴ with it. If you were to point a finger at it, you would distract from what the movie is really about. This could be a movie about any two groups, even Democrats⁵ and Republicans (laughter).

LUNDEN: The film's script was adapted by playwright⁶ Itamar Moses. He says the show resonates more now than when he and Yazbek were writing it.

ITAMAR MOSES: It suddenly felt really urgent to say that people are people and when you strip away politics and these sort of rigid⁷ tribes that we seem to cling to and belong to, everybody can connect over the need for food and shelter and music and the need for love itself.

(SOUNDBITE OF BROADWAY MUSICAL, "THE BAND'S VISIT")

TONY SHALHOUB: (As Tewfiq, foreign language spoken).

(SOUNDBITE OF DAVID YAZBEK'S "HAJ-BUTRUS")

LUNDEN: The score certainly doesn't sound like a typical Broadway musical. Tony Shalhoub, best-known as the TV character Monk⁸, plays the Egyptian bandleader.

SHALHOUB: Yeah, it's the first musical I've ever heard of that has Arabic music and Israeli music and people singing in both languages.

LUNDEN: Some of the actors also play instruments, like violinist George Abud.

GEORGE ABUD: When you're a Lebanese actor - an Arabic actor in New York, you go in for certain roles, and you are kind of destined⁹ to play certain situations. And most of the situations are politicized or religious or terrorists. And then finally we get a play where you kind of - everyone's just being a person.

LUNDEN: In a series of vignettes, the Egyptian band members and their Israeli hosts get to know one another. There are stressed-out parents, angsty teens, a band member obsessed¹⁰ with Chet Baker¹¹. Tony Shalhoub's bandleader has an almost romance with a cafe owner played by Katrina Lenk. She says these two somewhat lonely characters with complicated histories discover...

LENK: That magical thing that can happen when you meet a stranger and suddenly you feel like you can tell them things that you can't tell people that are your good friends.

LUNDEN: They learn they both have similar taste in Egyptian music and movies.

(SOUNDBITE OF BROADWAY MUSICAL, "THE BAND'S VISIT")

LENK: (As Dina, singing) Umm Kulthum and Omar Sharif came floating on a jasmine wind.

LUNDEN: Tony Shalhoub says by not emphasizing the political conflicts between the Egyptians and Israelis...

SHALHOUB: It's political almost by virtue¹² of the fact that it isn't. It isn't a story about politics. And somehow, today everything becomes political. It's the prism we all look through now.

LUNDEN: Which "The Band's Visit" suggests might not be the only way to look at things.

For NPR News, I'm Jeff Lunden in New York.

1 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

2 stranded   

a.搁浅的，进退两难的

参考例句：

• He was stranded in a strange city without money. 他流落在一个陌生的城市里， 身无分文，一筹莫展。
• I was stranded in the strange town without money or friends. 我困在那陌生的城市，既没有钱，又没有朋友。

3 overtly   

ad.公开地

参考例句：

• There were some overtly erotic scenes in the film. 影片中有一些公开色情场面。
• Nietzsche rejected God's law and wrote some overtly blasphemous things. 尼采拒绝上帝的律法，并且写了一些渎神的作品。

4 dealing   

n.经商方法，待人态度

参考例句：

• This store has an excellent reputation for fair dealing.该商店因买卖公道而享有极高的声誉。
• His fair dealing earned our confidence.他的诚实的行为获得我们的信任。

5 democrats   

n.民主主义者，民主人士( democrat的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The Democrats held a pep rally on Capitol Hill yesterday. 民主党昨天在国会山召开了竞选誓师大会。
• The democrats organize a filibuster in the senate. 民主党党员组织了阻挠议事。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 playwright   

n.剧作家，编写剧本的人

参考例句：

• Gwyn Thomas was a famous playwright.格温·托马斯是著名的剧作家。
• The playwright was slaughtered by the press.这位剧作家受到新闻界的无情批判。

7 rigid   

adj.严格的，死板的；刚硬的，僵硬的

参考例句：

• She became as rigid as adamant.她变得如顽石般的固执。
• The examination was so rigid that nearly all aspirants were ruled out.考试很严，几乎所有的考生都被淘汰了。

8 monk   

n.和尚，僧侣，修道士

参考例句：

• The man was a monk from Emei Mountain.那人是峨眉山下来的和尚。
• Buddhist monk sat with folded palms.和尚合掌打坐。

9 destined   

adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的

参考例句：

• It was destined that they would marry.他们结婚是缘分。
• The shipment is destined for America.这批货物将运往美国。

10 obsessed   

adj.心神不宁的,鬼迷心窍的,沉迷的

参考例句：

• He's obsessed by computers. 他迷上了电脑。
• The fear of death obsessed him throughout his old life. 他晚年一直受着死亡恐惧的困扰。

11 baker   

n.面包师

参考例句：

• The baker bakes his bread in the bakery.面包师在面包房内烤面包。
• The baker frosted the cake with a mixture of sugar and whites of eggs.面包师在蛋糕上撒了一层白糖和蛋清的混合料。

12 virtue   

n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力

参考例句：

• He was considered to be a paragon of virtue.他被认为是品德尽善尽美的典范。
• You need to decorate your mind with virtue.你应该用德行美化心灵。