“Where politicians and diplomats fail, artists and storytellers may yet succeed,” says Silk Road Rising founding artistic director Jamil Khoury.
Khoury and the playwrights and directors involved with Semitic Commonwealth envision the festival not as an end in itself, but as the start of a conversation... The festival’s creators don’t think it’s too idealistic to expect plays to have an effect on policy.
[Silk Road Rising's] upcoming series, "Semitic Commonwealth," featuring six plays by Arab and Jewish playwrights, explores the human themes of identity, occupation, home, and exile that underscore both sides of the conflict’s human toll.
In curating the pieces [for Semitic Commonwealth], Jamil Khoury was more concerned with examining the humanity behind the conflict, rather than focusing the discussion on "rooting for one's team."
