A murder in the West Bank and two cops, one Palestinian, one Israeli, must work together to solve the case. Facts is a tense play that sets out to uncover the underlying historical, cultural and political frameworks for one of the most gridlocked conflicts of our time. At the Finborough Theatre.
An American is murdered in the city of Hebron and two unlikely investigators are put in a room together to dig up the truth. The cultural triad of America, Israel and Palastine is very much the focus of this murder mystery. Set in the dreary interrogation room of a police station, impressively designed by Georgis Lowe, we are witness to the unwilling collaborators mulling over ideas concerning the case, and raising bigger issues about religion or the accuracy of historical accounts. When we find out that the victim was an archeologist whose excavations and research defied the existence of Moses and even the great Jewish King David the stakes of the investigation rise considerably. If the exodus never happened the divine predestination for the Jewish people to occupy the sacred land and therefore the base for the mighty movement of Zionism falls apart.
The writing is very dense and is vigilant about not taking sides too easily. Having grown up in a household with extremist zionist beliefs, Facts is Arthur Milner’s way of accounting for the complicated web of unmovable notions of entitlement for the sacred land. An archeological piece in itself, it tries to show that the motivations of all the parties involved in the political conflict are not simply black and white or good or bad, but results of centuries of misunderstandings and biased interpretations of history for their own cause. En route to solving the case fixed points in alliances dissolve and residual anger breaks out from under the surface. To create this scope in a small room with only three people is quite a storytelling achievement. However, in the course of the actual investigation there are some conclusions the detectives jump to that are made out to be more self-evident than they really are – but that is not really the point of the piece anyway.
Philip Arditti’s Khalid opens the show with a pantomimic portrayal of a checkpoint hold-up. It’s an stylistic element that does not reoccur, and one of the few elements of the show that feels a bit unfocused and alienating. However, it does serve to illustrate the absurdity of how even Palastinians of high rank are subjugated to the humiliation of time-comsuming border controls in their own city. Either that or they need to go to elaborate lengths to travel to their desired location, while their Israeli neighbours are allowed to move around freely. People are not equal in the West Bank, they are Arab or Jews and treated accordingly. Arditti’s superbly judged performance adds considerably to the tension proposed by this conflict.
Michael Feast, who seems not entirely at ease in the intimate space of the Finborough, does not quite bring the necessary gravitas to the Israeli police investigator Yossi. Possibly a directorial choice, his performance somewhat stands in the way of the piece’s intentions to blur the character’s motivations. A self-proclaimed “devout atheist”, Yossi represents the secular Jewish community that feels uneasy about the extremist approach of his people and the illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
When it comes to the question of land or peace there is no question for suspect Danny (Paul Rattray) as to what is more sacred. An extremist Jew who supports the settlements in the West Bank, he is in the current focus of the ongoing blame game for the continuing conflict and makes for a perfect suspect. Is he guilty? Who has the power the to end the the vicious circle of violence? Can Arabs and Jews ever live together peacefully? Facts is a play that has high stakes and manages to balance them in an intruiging way. The end is surprisingly inconsequential for a work dealing with such grand issues, however this could be taken as befitting the political conflict from which the piece is born.