Four part disharmony

Daniel Nelson

Asif Khan in Love, Bombs & Apples

Image by Arcola Theatre

But writer Hassan Abdulrazzak puts people before polemic, and Asif Khan breathes life into the words of the four characters who inhabit Love, Bombs & Apples at London’s Arcola Theatre.

The result is a witty, entertaining, interesting four-piece suite.

The first story, Love In A Time Of Barriers, is based on an anecdote told to Abdulrazzak – a molecular biologist of Iraqi heritage, born in Prague and living in London – about a Palestinian actor captivated by a green-eyed visiting British activist who finds a desperately unsuitable place for sex. The two end up performing in front of an unexpected and potentially dangerous band of onlookers. “I thought it was a lovely human way of telling the story of Israel and Palestine,” Abdulrazzak told a post-performance discussion.

Next comes a delightful cameo of a camp Pakistani writer whose attempt at literature, “the definitive 9/11 novel”, is so literally descriptive that it’s taken as a terrorist manual rather than a creative novel. His naivety even gets him through incarceration (“Between you and me, being in prison is the best thing that ever happened to me.”)

In the third tale, the shiny lure of an iPhone and of consumer glitz are compared to the attraction of ISIS, and the young Muslim in Bradford telling the story (“Allah must have written it this way – the Hindus have all the restaurants and we have all the cabs”) finally morphs into the fourth story, Landing Strip, about a Jewish New Yorker whose ill-advised attempt to spice up his sex-life opens out into an examination of the distinctions between anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism. That and the power of the Israeli lobby in the US are controversial issues that Abdulrazzak negotiates bravely and subtly.

The four pieces started life as a short monologue, Love In The Time Of Barriers, for Khan to perform as a showcase. They have grown into something far more.

“All the characters want simple things,” says Abdulrazzak, “but then the politics come in.”

* Love, Bombs & Apples is at the Arcola, 24 Ashwin Street, E8 until 25 June. Info: 7503 1646/ www.arcolatheatre.com

+ 21 (without Hassan), 24 June, post-show Q&A, Asif Khan, Rosamunde Hutt, Hassan Abdulrazzak

+ 22 June, pre-show discussion, Is Building a Wall the Only Way?, Rachel Shabi, Hassan Abdulrazzak, 6.30-7.15pm