"My name is Rachel Corrie" tomorrow in NYC

The Rachel Corrie play that was censored in NYC a few weeks back will be performed tomorrow. Details below — but first a quote from a Harold Pinter interview published in The Guardian on 14 March (Thanks to Standard Schaefer for drawing attention to it by posting it to the Lucipo list).

“I’m alarmed at what has happened to My Name Is Rachel Corrie in New York [the play recently co-edited from Corrie’s diaries and letters by Alan Rickman and Katharine Viner] … The real fact there, as you know, is that Rachel Corrie was a young American woman who was looking at the Palestinian situation in Israel when one of the bulldozers that was demolishing Palestinian houses ran over and killed her. But that play has now been withdrawn by the producing theatre in New York and that is, I think, typical of what is happening more and more in Britain and America: suppression of dissent and the truth. I’d just point to the example of the prohibition of protest within a certain area outside the Houses of Parliament. One woman walked into this zone and read out the names of British soldiers killed in Iraq of whom at that time there were about 80. She was arrested, fined and now has a criminal record. What she was actually doing, in reading the names of the British dead outside the Houses of Parliament, was reminding people in Parliament of their ultimate responsibility. So the lid was put on her straight away.”

RACHEL’S WORDS

Wednesday, March 22nd
Riverside Church
490 Riverside Drive (at 120th Street)

8:00 pm

$20 Suggested donation
Tickets can be purchased on line at www.rachelswords.org or with cash/check at the door
(No one turned away for lack of funds • Doors open at 7:30)

Co-hosts: Amy Goodman and James Zogby

Participating: Anthony Arnove, Huwaida Arraf, Brian Avery, Nirit Ben-Ari, Leila Buck, Kia Corthron, Hedy Epstein, Sherif Fam, Suheir Hammad, Leonard Hubbard from“The Roots” with A. Marcy Francis, Brian Jones, Liz Magnes, Malachy McCourt, Betty Shamieh, Jonathan Tasini, Zafer Tawil, Tom Wallace, Ora Wise, and Maysoon Zayid.

Rachel’s parents, Cindy and Craig Corrie, will also be speaking.

Appearing via video/statements will be Maya Angelou, Kathleen Chalfant, Eve Ensler, Mariam Said, Patti Smith and Howard Zinn.

“My Name is Rachel Corrie” is a powerful one-woman show based entirely on the diaries and emails of Rachel Corrie. Rachel was a human rights activist and gifted writer. She was crushed to death by an Israeli Army bulldozer as she tried to protect the home of a Palestinian pharmacist from demolition in Rafah, Gaza Strip, on March 16th, 2003. Rachel was 23.

The play was scheduled to open at the New York Theatre Workshop on March 22nd. It has been postponed indefinitely, sparking an escalating controversy. Rachel’s words will still be heard on March 22nd. Rachel wrote about issues that concern us all. Come hear an array of academics, activists, performers and playwrights read selected writings of Rachel Corrie, honor her through poems and songs, and discuss the context in which her words were written and the pervasive climate of fear in which they have been suppressed.

For updated information or to buy advance tickets, visit www.RachelsWords.org.