Exploring differences through drag
Ballad of the Burning Star addresses Israeli-Palestinian conflict with song and dance
The political powder keg of the Middle East just found a new weapon of mass destruction: his name is Nir Paldi, he performs in drag and he’s the lead performer in Ballad of the Burning Star, the award-winning musical that opens Tuesday night at the Theatre Centre. The Acting Up Stage/Why Not Theatre joint production bills itself as “a drag musical about identity, humanity and the Israel-Palestine conflict,” a premise that’s guaranteed to raise eyebrows.
“I wanted to do a very personal story about my own personal experiences growing up as a gay man in the middle of the whole Israeli situation,” says Paldi on the phone from his London home. “But then I realized I could do so much more than that and do it in a more interesting way.”
And so he did. He united his own skills as a talented drag cabaret performer with a troupe of international female artists to create a piece of musical theatre quite unlike any other: all singing, all dancing, all preconception-shattering.
“The problem in Israel is that there are no clear boundaries and the borders keep changing, and I’m not just talking politically. But it’s not a simple matter of how gays are treated,” Paldi says.
Paldi and his co-creator George Mann looked at finding a way to utilize the whole theatrical skill set at their disposal to deal with the complex realities of life in Israel: hidden identities, concealed beliefs (political as well as personal) and an overall sense of not being able to say what you really mean.
“I felt that drag could set you free as a political performer . . . Genderbending devices allow you all sorts of freedom.”
Once he began exploring his stories of life in Israel through the prism of drag, backed up by an abrasive female chorus of in-your-face cabaret performers, Paldi found a tremendous freedom emerging.
“Yes, things can be dark in Israel, but it’s exactly where things are darkest that drag should thrive,” he says. “Some satirists want to paint everything in black or white, but if you’re living in the situation, it’s a multicoloured sort of experience, where death and laughter sometimes run hand in hand.”
The show first debuted at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2013, where it was an immediate hit, winning the stage award for Best Ensemble and earning reviews that called it “a theatrical hand grenade,” “a thrillingly edgy piece of entertainment” and “breathlessly inventive.”
All of that, of course, made Paldi very happy, but he was even more pleased by “people’s direct responses to me. Some people wanted me to be more Israeli, whatever that means. I said, ‘Look, I’m a person first and that’s what you’re seeing on stage,’ behind the drag and the makeup and the cabaret persona.”
But although the show packs a political punch, “My primary concern,” Paldi insists, “was to give people a tantalizing experience of how I grew up in Israel and the internal conflict I experienced in this place, first being raised here and then leaving.”
As an entertainer first, however, Paldi is eager to characterize Ballad of the Burning Star as “a complete roller coaster ride. It takes you from bursting out laughing to feeling extremely angry, followed by being extremely moved. It’s a very provocative show that will make you feel and think.
“Some people would say we are too pro-Israeli. Others would say we’re pro-Palestinian. It’s an extremely complex situation. You come for yourself and make your own mind up.” Ballad of the Burning Star runs from Tuesday to Sunday at the Theatre Centre (1115 Queen St. W.). Tickets at burningstar.ca or at 416-538-0988.