Tickets for Vahe’s new play, Gyank, are now on sale. For more information about the play, visit our Gyank page.

When: March 16 – April 1, 2012. Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays at 8:00 p.m. Sundays at 7:00 p.m.
Where: El Portal Theatre. 5269 Lankershim Blvd., North Hollywood, CA 91601
How: Purchase tickets at http://www.itsmyseat.com/Gyank/

By Ana Sirabionian

How can we get Armenian kids to gain an interest and even work towards enriching the Armenian arts? And, who will be the next generation of Armenian artists and playwrights working out of the diaspora (who can read, write, and speak Armenian)? Students with an interest in the arts, who have also had a formal education in the Armenian language from an Armenian school, would probably be the best candidates…

I attended an Armenian school for 14 years (pre-K-12th) and have taught at two different Armenian schools in the past seven years. Through my experiences as both student and teacher, I can safely say that private Armenian school students tend to have little to no interest in pursuing the arts. It’s not that the talent is lacking. As an English teacher I’ve come across great writers, and as a Drama teacher I’ve come across great actors. I’ve also come across kids who aren’t very good at either, but love math and want to major in engineering. But when asking the writers/actors of the class what line of work they’re interested in, the answer is usually something like, “LAW”. That’s a fine career choice, but if all the Armenian kids who show artistic/creative potential go into unrelated fields, where does the future of our culture lie?

I also taught at a public school for a year. There, the “theater kids” had talent and spunk. They could sing, dance, and act and they were proud of it and they wanted to actually build on their talents and pursue a career in the arts. What a crazy thought! Was there no one in their household to advise them to study law or medicine instead?

Many Armenian schools offer Drama classes or clubs as well. Our departments may not be as well funded or equipped, but most students, at one point or another, are given the opportunity to be involved in a small production. From my experiences, these productions are usually fun while they last, parents and other guests take their snapshots, but the gratification and inspiration gained from them is short-lived, and then it’s off to more important things. It’s just never taken too seriously.

The truth is we are a small community in a large diaspora, and we are striving to keep our identity and respect as a people. Thus, we cultivate our kids to become successful adults who hold important positions. There’s nothing wrong with that. We need Armenian doctors, lawyers, politicians, CEO’s, in order to gain respect for ourselves in American society. However, what will happen to the arts if we make doctors and lawyers of all the talent our youth has to offer? I grew up with an understanding that a culture is defined mainly by its art: theater, dance, music, literature…Without these, a culture becomes indistinguishable. A united set of attitudes and values is also essential in defining a culture. Perhaps that’s the problem; our values are a bit skewed. We know how important art is, but in a land of so much other opportunity, we’re afraid to sacrifice our kids to art.

By Shahe Mankerian

“History does not repeat itself, but it does rhyme.” – Mark Twain

“Because it often does, let’s assume history repeats itself,” I address a classroom full of sleepy 8th graders, “and let’s assume the genocidal claws of a new, bloodthirsty nation attempts to annihilate the disaporan Armenians in Los Angeles. And let’s assume within this speculative pogrom, the dark forces decide to assemble the intellectual elite of the Armenian populace: the poets, the playwrights, the painters, and the musicians—just like the times of old—the ceremonial cutting off the head before the mass extermination. Who amongst us will be the contemporary Siamanto or Varujan and lose his precious, scholarly head?” Silence.

I notice a brave hand in the back of the room eager to participate. “Yes, Mr. Mouradian, shed some light on this conundrum.” Mouradian, the archetypal impish 8th grader, with hair in disarray, the cornerstone of every blessed classroom, responds with pride, “Baron,” he says, “the guys from System of a Down—they, they will be our new martyrs.” The class erupts in laughter. May God multiply the Mouradians. The schools of the world do not have enough performance classes to flourish these spotlight-grabbing, laughter jockeys. Unfortunately, it is not clear if Mouradian’s statement is in jest or in earnest.

Moosig, the freckled-faced spokesperson for the girls, rambunctiously says, “Young people nowadays don’t care about the Arts.”

I say, “That’s like saying, fish nowadays don’t care about water.”

On my drive home, I partially blame parents for perpetuating the notion that poetry or splattered paint or post-pubescent plays do not generate prosperity but poverty. I continue flinging my frustration toward principals and misguided teachers for fanning the mantra that being an artist does not produce fame but famine. Then I point ten accusatory fingers at me. I am that parent, that principal, and that misguided teacher. I am that impostor.

Wallowing in self-pity is like swimming in wet cement on a hot day. Before it hardens and becomes concrete, get out. Subconsciously, I do want my three-year-old to grow to be a brain surgeon at Cedars-Sinai or somewhere close to home. I do want her teachers to encourage her to take drawing assignments little less seriously and thrust the periodic table delicately down her baby throat. As a Principal of an Armenian school, I do want a brand new science lab in place of the Art studio. More parents will praise my mature foresight for the advancement of the children.

But when was the last time a society advanced without the Arts? All children gravitate toward the paint, the paper, and the pulse of the melody. All children learn initially to the poetics of the nursery rhyme. Go ahead, take away the crayons and the colored pencils, they’ll soon find mud and turn it into Monet. They’ll turn dung into Rodin. Next to starvation, the only other evil we can do to children is to rob them of the Arts. Long before the death march to the desert, the architects of the genocide silenced the artists, and then came the starvation.

Shahe Mankerian is the Principal & Middle School English Teacher of St. Gregory A. & M. Hovsepian School in Pasadena, CA.

by Aram Kouyoumdjian

It’s hard to think of Vahe Berberian as lonely. If you ever meet him for coffee at a certain Starbucks in the Valley – a place affectionately referred to as his “office” – you soon realize how difficult it will be to hold a conversation with him because virtually every patron who walks into the place will know Vahe and stop to exchange a few words.

Yet, as a contemporary Armenian dramatist on these diasporan shores, Vahe cuts a solitary figure with hardly any company. He is a rare specimen who composes plays in Western Armenian – a language that the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has decreed “endangered.”

Over the four years that have elapsed since Vahe’s previous full-length play, “Baron Garbis,” premiered in early 2008, there have been no more than two or three productions of original Western Armenian plays in our community; without exception, they have been trite farces that are best forgotten. It should shock us that in a community of this size and affluence, theatrical productivity is practically nil.

Vahe’s new play, “Gyank” (Life), speaks to this existential angst – not because its plotline features a character on the verge of death, but because its script is written in a language actually threatened with extinction.

Truth be told, Western Armenian drama has always been imperiled. We can list pre-Genocide censorship and post-Genocide trauma among the obvious reasons, but I’ve always thought that there is a third cause for its arrested development: the Western Armenian language itself.

In its modern form (ashkharhapar), Western Armenian has never been the language of an independent Armenian nation. Spoken mainly in historical Armenia (under Ottoman domination) and, later, in diaspora communities, it has been infiltrated by impurities, absorbing words and expressions from the languages of oppressors (Turkish) or of host countries (Arabic, English, and French). It also has the problem of “gor” – the gerund (or “-ing” form of verbs) – which sounds natural in speech but turns into an eyesore in writing. Western Armenian dramatists face a difficult choice – accepting to write in a vernacular that’s messy, or insisting on a pure, literary language that’s strained and artificial.

Not only does Vahe embrace the Western Armenian vernacular, he revels in it. He has an uncanny ear for the vocabulary and the cadence of the language spoken by Armenians from the Middle East; indeed, the way his characters speak often proves as important as what they say.

Why am I thus preoccupied with Western Armenian, when I can just as easily extol the fluid lyricism of Eastern Armenian? I’m preoccupied with Western Armenian because it is the language of our diaspora. It contains the history of our dispersion. Its impure lexicon is a testament to the influences that have shaped us and the oppressions we have borne. Its clutter reflects the hybrid – and even multiple – identities we’ve come to cultivate in exile.

So I greet “Gyank” not just as a play that will be thought-provoking or moving or funny. I greet it as a new marker of Western Armenian drama’s endurance. And I wish it long life.
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Aram Kouyoumdjian is the winner of Elly Awards for both playwriting (“The Farewells”) and directing (“Three Hotels”). His latest work is “Happy Armenians.”