Ismail Khalaf... Atta's career in acting, directing, and writing has spanned for forty years

Al-Hasakah - SANA

For forty years, the experience of the playwright and theater director, Ismail Khalaf, was characterized by richness and diversity between acting, directing, writing and arbitration, through which he was able to secure an advanced place for him in the theatrical movement at the level of Al-Hasakah Governorate and Syria, and to receive honors and many awards at the local and Arab levels.

Khalaf said in an interview with SANA reporter: “My theatrical beginnings are very early, as I entered this beautiful world for the first time in 1978 at the hands of the playwright Issam Al-Manea. Plays for adults, after which I will win the award for the best actor and literary author at the level of Syria for three consecutive years in the Pioneers of Pioneers competitions.

Khalaf adds: “I started in the field of theatrical directing when I was a student in the eighth grade, and in the tenth grade I won the best director award in the first theater festival held in Al-Hasakah Governorate for the play “The Pharaohs Again.” After that, I started to participate in the central theater festivals, where In 1989, she won the Best Theater Director Award at the Theater Festival in Homs Governorate for the play “Eva”, and then the best theatrical work for the play Waiting for Gilgamesh.

Khalaf shows that his theatrical participations followed in the theaters of youth, students, university and workers, and during this trip the presented works won dozens of awards, whether at the level of performances, directing or actors, through which the Al-Hasakah Governorate theater gained fame at the level of the Syrian governorates, pointing out that during these years In addition to his work in directing and acting, he worked in writing theatrical scripts, some of which he turned into theatrical performances, in addition to documenting the history of theater in the province in a book he called “Theatre in Al-Hasakah Governorate, a ninety-year march.”

In addition to his participation in acting, directing, and authoring, Khalaf refers to his participation in the arbitration committees within many festivals that were held, whether at the level of the governorate or outside it. Encouraging award for the year 2019 in the field of theatrical creativity.

Regarding his experience as director of the National Theater in Al-Hasakah Governorate since 2010 until now, Khalaf explained that during that he sought to devote the Al-Hasakah Theater Festival to its successive sessions, in addition to the Folklore Festival, and then the “Tarabek Gold” and “Fragrant Heritage” festivals.

Regarding the importance of the children's theater, Khalaf pointed out that it presented dozens of theatrical productions for children under the darkest conditions that the governorate went through, as a result of the terrorist war imposed on the Syrian people and the absence of children from the theaters of cultural centers, as the National Theater was keen to present its performances in squares, parks and schools starting from The firm belief in the importance of the young spectator, who will one day be a true supporter of the theater as an actor, director, or spectator.

On the role of the theater in the province during the years of war, Khalaf said: The national theater was in a state of challenge, as we were keen as much as possible that what was presented on stage had a real pulse and had an emotional relationship with the spectator touching his daily and national concern, his dreams and his failures, adding: Most of what we worked on He was concerned with the Syrian man.

Khalaf stressed that despite all the conditions the governorate is experiencing and its repercussions on various aspects of life, including culture and theatre, we are clinging to hope and a better tomorrow, and that the theater movement in the governorate continues with its giving and brilliance.

Nizar Hassan

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