Charlie Rose

JohnGelles  04/27/2011 06:58 AM Report

From the Official Website for the play:

"The lives of two American Marines and an Iraqi translator are forever changed by an encounter with a quick-witted tiger who haunts the streets of war-torn Baghdad attempting to find meaning, forgiveness and redemption amidst the city’s ruins. Rajiv Joseph's groundbreaking new American play explores both the power and the perils of human nature. The New York Times writes, "This boldly imagined, harrowing and surprisingly funny drama is wonderfully daring."

.

I watched this interview between CR and the team that wrote, directed and acted the play that deals with human nature and the facts of war in Iraq. I only watched it once

and was impressed, as were the interviewees, with Robin Williams comic energy and confidence.

The up-close and personal of any war is frightful. Bombs and bullets tearing human bodies and flesh apart.

Even the most necessary war is frightful if you're dying in pain for other people to live in peace and carry on the tasks required to make human nature fit the democratic mold in the mind's of men like Woodrow Wilson and George Bush junior -- you, the warrior, are still the one who is sacrificed for a cause forever in doubt.

So, at the heart of the play are universal themes of tragedy, sacrifice, and hope.

The tiger eats when he is hungry the food that God provided. When the food is human, with a will and words to express the difficulty of his position, what you get is more than just a meal. It is the indigestion that puts all things in doubt -- when generals, presidents and playrights are required to prevent doubt from paralyzing decision.

I have been with President Bush most of the way with our recent past.

I hated when he fought a necessary war on the CHEAP.

But I would have had nothing but praise for him if he had mobilized the nation to win the war as fast as it deserved to do in that region what we did in Europe after destroying so much of Germany.

The Iraqi playright paints a picture with more than simple politicl dreams at its core. He has imagined what it is to eat and be eaten at about the same time.

BarackMcBush  04/26/2011 02:58 PM Report

This Play looks fascinating . I also consider Robin Williams to be perhaps the greatest over-rated Comic of all time. If his stand up is considered genius,it's genius that escapes me.(I like clever or observational like Seinfeld or Chris Rock)

REMant  04/25/2011 01:00 PM Report

I remember hearing about the incident and the play, which I suppose the author sees as a metaphor for the whole Iraq fiasco, however, I dislike most of these docudrama things, unless they approach Richard III or Oedipus. On that note critics admire Williams, who was offered the role to raise the play's visibility, for the paucity of wisecracks, while audiences seem to wonder where they went. It is certainly not IMHO anything to be laughed at. Nor should there be anyway anyone can view Iraq as an act of heroism against evil or perfidy, as intended by its adolescent purveyors, and it certainly did not have an happy ending.