by Ayad Akhtar Nov 15 - Nov 28 From the Director “The difference between the who and the what at the heart of love, separates the heart. It is often said that love is the movement of the heart. Does my heart move because I love someone who is an absolute singularity, or because I love the way that someone is? That is to say, the history of love, the heart of love, is divided between the who and what.” Jacques Derrida Zarina is a brilliant, strong-willed, and independent young woman—an aspiring author who’s determined to tell the human story of the man known as the Prophet, Muhammad. After years of being taught by her devoted yet overbearing father all of the “what’s” of the Prophet’s life—Aisha was his favorite wife, he had a gap between his teeth—she’s committed herself to the task of sifting out the “who.” Heedless of her younger sister Mahwish’s assertion that women in Islam are “just fine,” Zarina is determined to shine a light on “what the faith does to women.” Zarina’s father, Afzal, has other plans in mind. A charming and savvy businessman from Pakistan, he prides himself on knowing what’s best for everyone—particularly Zarina. When he successfully matchmakes Zarina with Eli, a patient and good-natured white convert who runs a masjid, Afzal is certain he’s found the answers to her endless questions about Islam and about love. When the truth about Zarina’s book is finally revealed, however, everyone is forced to confront the source of their own love and test the bounds of their forgiveness. The story of an immigrant family at odds with itself is an old one. At its heart, Akhtar’s play is about a father unwilling to change in order to keep up with the new world in which his daughters now live. Yet The Who & The What feels newly poignant in this moment of extreme national separation. Not only is our country visited by deep religious and political divides, but we find ourselves physically divided in new ways as well, forced to breach even longer distances to reach our families. I hope this fierce and tender story resonates with all of you. In a year marked by unfamiliar distance, it feels so special to have come together to share this story and to invite you back into the theatre. Aneesha Kudtarkar Production Partner #TheWho&TheWhat #TheaterWorksHartford theaterworkshartford @theaterworksct @theaterworksct THE WHO & THE WHAT by Ayad Akhtar directed by Aneesha Kudtarkar THE CAST (alphabetical order) Afzal RAJESH BOSE Eli STEPHEN ELROD Mahwish SANAM LAILA HASHEMI Zarina JESSICA JAIN Set Design BRIAN PRATHER Adapted from a design for the stage by MICHAEL SCHWEIKARDT Costume Design MIKA EUBANKS Lighting Design AMITH CHANDRASHAKER Sound Design S.R. Video Production MICELI PRODUCTIONS Casting DESTINY LILLY, CSA Production Stage Manager KATE J. CUDWORTH Photos by Brian Prather The World Premiere of THE WHO & THE WHAT Produced in 2014 by La Jolla Playhouse, La Jolla, California Christopher Ashley, Artistic Director & Michael S. Rosenberg, Managing Director Produced by LCT3/ Lincoln Center Theater, New York City, 2014 THE WHO & THE WHAT is presented by special arrangement with Dramatists Play Service, Inc., New York. Actors appear with the permission of SAG/AFTRA TheaterWorks is celebrating its 35th season as a non-profit, professional theater company. Founded in 1985. THE WHO & THE WHAT is the 3rd production of the 2020-2021 Season. TheaterWorks • 233 Pearl Street • Hartford, CT 06103 • 2020 WHO RAJESH BOSE (Afzal) is thrilled to be returning to TheaterWorks Hartford after appearing in their recent production of The Invisible Hand. Other Regional and Off-Broadway favorites include: The Crucible (Bedlam), Henry VI (NAATCO), Pygmalion (Bedlam), Against the Hillside (Ensemble Studio Theatre), Indian Ink (Roundabout), Oslo (St. Louis Rep), Mary Stuart (Folger Theatre), Guards at the Taj (Capital Stage), Disgraced (Playmakers Rep, Huntington Theatre, Long Wharf Theatre – Connecticut Critics Circle Award, IRNE Nomination), and The Who & The What (Gulfshore Playhouse). Film & Television: Quantico, Blacklist, Blue Bloods, Elementary, Damages, Nurse Jackie, Madam Secretary, The Good Wife, Law & Order: SVU, Criminal Minds, the series finale ofThe Sopranos, and the Academy Award nominated filmFrozen River. STEPHEN ELROD (Eli) is making his TheaterWorks Hartford debut. Off-Broadway: Sideways (Theatre at St Clement's), When It Happens To You (The Sheen Center). Regional: Macbeth, Othello, The Taming of the Shrew (Shakespeare Theatre Company), Songs of Bilitis (South Coast Repertory). SANAM LAILA HASHEMI (Mahwish) is so excited to be making her TheaterWorks Hartford debut! Recent credits: Pilgrims Musa & Sheri in the New World (Mosaic Theater); Tiny Beautiful Things (Lake Dillon); The Christians (Virginia Rep/Cadence Theatre); Dance Nation (TheatreLAB). Sanam is a proud member of the Pipeline New Works Fellowship and holds a B.A. from Virginia Tech. She is grateful to her family and friends for their support. sanamlailahashemi.com JESSICA JAIN (Zarina) is thrilled to tell this story with this team. She is making her TheaterWorks Hartford debut. Favorite Credits include: Pitch Perfect, The Last Word, The Metal Children, Pride and Prejudice, and Godspell. Proud graduate of the Louisiana State M.F.A. acting program. Great lover of her dog Clifford (and all dogs), plants, and The Jains. AYAD AKHTAR (Playwright) was born in New York City and raised in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He is the author of the recently published and critically acclaimed novel Homeland Elegies. He was also recently named president of the prestigious PEN America, the nation’s foremost literary and free expression organization. He is a playwright, screenwriter and novelist. His play Disgraced played at New York's Lincoln Center Theater in 2012 and premiered at the Bush Theater in London. Disgraced won the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. His play The Invisible Hand was nominated for the ATCA/ Steinberg Award, and won Best New Work 2013 from the St. Louis Theater Critics Circle. As a screenwriter, he was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Screenplay for The War Within. He has received commissions from Lincoln Center and the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. He is a graduate of Brown and Columbia Universities with degrees in Theater and Film Directing. ANEESHA KUDTARKAR (Director) is a New York-based theatre director. She is a trained Indian Classical dancer who calls upon her background in dance to create compositionally driven pieces of theatre that often centralize and celebrate underrepresented communities. Her recent directorial projects include Men on Boats (Southern Methodist University), [Veil Widow Conspiracy] (National Asian American Theatre Company), LOCUSTS, Trouble in Mind (Yale School of Drama), The Purple Flower (Yale Cabaret), Mud (Hangar Theatre). Aneesha is an alumna of the Drama League Directors Project and a graduate of the Yale School of Drama. BRIAN PRATHER (Set Design) is always excited to design for his adopted artistic home. His most recent TheaterWorks Hartford designs include: American Son, Fully Committed, Girlfriend, The River, and Relativity, among many others. Recent Off-Broadway designs include: Caesar and Cleopatra (GTG), Daniels’s Husband (Primary Stages), Widower’s Houses (TACT/Gingold), A Christmas Carol (St. Clement’s), Becoming Dr. Ruth (Westside), Freud’s Last Session (New World Stages), and The Burnt Part Boys (Playwrights Horizons). International: Chung-mu Art Hall (South Korea). Regional: Alley Theatre, Asolo Rep, Goodspeed Musicals, Barrington Stage Co., Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, Capitol Rep., among many others. Jeff Award winner (Chicago), Emmy nomination (New England) for “The Kate” on Public Television, two-time Berkshire Theatre Critics Assoc. Awards winner, Associate Artist at Barrington Stage Co. and member of USA Local 829. Brian is the Resident Designer and Design Coordinator for TheaterWorks Hartford. brianprather.com. MIKA EUBANKS (Costume Design) received her MFA in Costume Design at Yale School of Drama where she has designed Death of Yazdgerd and Tent Revival. Other work includes Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again., In the Red and Brown Water, School Girls; Or The African Mean Girls Play, The Purple Flower (Yale Cabaret); Feeding Beatrice (Repertory Theatre of St. Louis); Harry and the Thief (Strand Theater); Animals Out of Paper (Silver Spring Theater); and The Clothesline Muse (National Black Theatre Festival). Currently in New York, but hailing from Baltimore, Mika has worked at Center Stage, the Hippodrome, and Morgan State University. She earned the Leo Lerman Graduate Fellowship in 2019, the Jada Pinkett Smith Applied Arts Award in 2015, and holds a BFA from Maryland Institute College of Art. In Spring 2019 she designed Twelfth Night at the Yale Repertory Theatre, for which she received the Connecticut Critic Circle Award for outstanding costume design. mikaeubanks.com AMITH CHANDRASHAKER (Lighting Design) Theater credits include: Russian Troll Farm, Actually, Fade (TheaterWorks Hartford), The Underlying Chris (Second Stage), Gnit (TFANA), Wives (Playwrights Horizons), A Human Being, Of A Sort (Williamstown), The Lucky Ones (Ars Nova), Boesman and Lena (DD & Hewes Award, The Signature), Blue Ridge (The Atlantic), Cardinal (2ST), Twelfth Night (The Public), Fairview (Soho Rep, WHO Berkeley Rep, TFANA), Fire in Dreamland (The Public), Her Requiem (LCT3), Seven Spots on the Sun (HH Nom., Rattlestick). Opera: The Flying Dutchman (Houston Grand Opera), Falstaff (Opera Omaha), The Scarlet Letter (Opera Colorado),