There’s a theatre in the village of Majdal Shams. It’s just a short walk from the family home Ebla Mari grew up in. It’s where she learned piano, and saw her first live theatre, too. In 2014, it was on its stage, racked with blinding stage-fright, that she first acted in front of an audience. Without the Oyoun theatre, Mari isn’t sure where she’d be today. She doubts she would be working as a drama teacher at a local middle school, a job which she loves. Certainly, she wouldn’t be on our Zoom call. Because it’s this theatre, the 26-year-old believes, that set her on a path that led her to being discovered by Ken Loach and starring in his upcoming, and likely final, feature film – The Old Oak – due for release this month internationally. Today, the theatre is on her mind again.
“Every time I stepped foot inside it,” she says, “I’d feel things. At first it was personal – I’m shy, and had this feeling that drama could free me from myself. Then I realised it was bigger than me: a way for our voices to be heard. It was somewhere to express ourselves, and to explore the struggles we face. For us here, that’s particularly important.” Nestled in the foothills of Mount Hermon, Majdal Shams is in the Golan Heights, an area to the northeast of Israel and the southwest of Syria. Since 1967, it’s been under Israeli military occupation. Today, it’s one of only five Druze villages that remain in the region. Before the annexation, there were hundreds.
