to the deer
Theatrical Play
When Izzy’s family move to a small rural town, the young queer Muslim boy becomes the salvation pet project to the local Pastor Isaac. In his attempt to reconcile his sexuality and faith, Izzy invents an imagined Garden of Eden, where Adam and Hawa’s (Eve in Arabic) relationship is turned upside down by the arrival of Steve, a beautiful, blue eyed, white skinned northerner.
"The Hooves Belonged to the Deer, a smart and sensual new play by Makram Ayache...is the most excitingly theatrical piece of new writing to premiere in Toronto so far this season" - J. Kelly Nestruck, The Globe and Mail, Critics' Pick.
Selected as one of top ten best productions in Ontario by the Globe and Mail in 2023
Winner of four Elizabeth Sterling Haynes Awards for Outstanding Independent Production of a Play (The Hooves Belonged to the Deer - In Arms Theatre Collective), Outstanding Director (Peter Hinton-Davis), Outstanding Set Design (Anahita Debonehie), and Outstanding Light Design (Whittyn Jason). With an additional two nominations for Outstanding Supporting Actor (Brett Dahl) and Outstanding Choreography, Intimacy Director, Fight Director (Corey Tazmania)
2023
Edmonton Production - In Arms Theatre Collective with support from Fringe Theatre Adventures
Directed by the extraordinary Peter Hinton-Davis.
Cast:
Brett Dahl - Steve/Jake
Adrian Pavone - Aadam/Reza
Bahareh Yaraghi - Hawa/Becky
David Ley - Pastor Isaac
Eric Wigston - Will
Makram Ayache - Izzy
Bringing back the Dora Award nominated set design is Anahita Dehbonehie
Stage Management by Andrea Handal Rivera
Intimacy and Movement Choreography by Corey Tazmania
Dramaturgy by Evan Medd
Sound Design by Chris Pereira
Light Design by Whittyn Jason
Technical Director Livl Bunge
Associate Production Manager Tori Morrison
Scenic Carpentry:
Head Carpenter - Hannah Bailey
Carpenter - Breanna Thomas
Technicians - Tyrena Miller & Emma Nokes
Photography by Mat Simpson
2023
World Premiere at Tarragon Theatre in association with Buddies in Bad Times Theatre
"The Hooves Belonged to the Deer, a smart and sensual new play by Makram Ayache...is the most excitingly theatrical piece of new writing to premiere in Toronto so far this season" - J. Kelly Nestruck, The Globe and Mail, Critics' Pick.
"It's a challenging, stylistically bold and audacious new work that has so many layers it warrants study and multiple viewings" - Glen Sumi, Critics' Pick.
"A disturbing theatrical work that rocked me right to my core. Theatre can do just that." Joe Szekeres, OurTheatreVoice.
"It is sexy, provcative, and dares to explore the darkest reaches of where internal conflict can be pushed." - Samantha Wu, Broadway World.
"Epic in its deliverance and its panorama, I experienced the same sort of sharp emotional jabs as when, for the first time, I saw "Angels in America" and "The Inheritance." Ross, Time Square Chronicles
"...is a major accomplishment for both Ayache and Tarragon, perhaps the most high-reaching and brave production of this remarkable season at Tarragon." - Aisling Murphy, Intermission Magazine
Photography by Cylla von Tiedemann
2022
Audio Play by Buddies in Bad Times Theatre
.jpg)
The Hooves Belonged to the Deer - An Audio Play produced by Buddies in Bad Times Theatre
DIRECTOR: Peter Hinton-Davis
DRAMATURGY: Evan Medd
ROLE: Izzy
CAST: Makram Ayache, Qasim Khan, Dalal Badr, Brett Dahl, Eric Wigston, and Ian Leung
PRODUCTION MANAGER: Giuseppe Caldoron
SOUND DESIGN: Chris Pereira
The Hooves Belonged to the Deer - An Audio Play, was released as part of Buddies in Bad Times Theatre's "Queer, Far, Wherever You Are" Series in 2022.
2020
The Hooves Belonged to the Deer was commissioned by the Alberta Queer Calendar Project in 2020 and had a month long release as a lifted reading on the Alberta Queer Calendar Project Podcast.
The following team recorded the AQCP's lifted reading:
DIRECTOR: Peter Hinton
DRAMATURGY: Evan Medd
ROLE: Izzy
CAST: Makram Ayache, Matt Nethersole, Helen Belay, Mathew Hulshof, Nathan Carroll, and Evan Medd
PRODUCTION MANAGER: Tori Morrison
SOUND DESIGN: Chris Pereira
POSTER DESIGN: Makram Ayache
"There is nothing pinched or cautious about the theatrical vision at play in The Hooves That Belonged To The Deer. It has a kind of cosmic expansiveness in its vistas, its theatricality, and its counterpoint of scenes. In a small conservative Christian prairie town, supremely white in palette and power structure, a young Arab Muslim boy, the quintessential outsider, enters the sin/salvation/damnation orbit of a Christian pastor who holds out the temptation of “belonging.” At the same moment, Izzy’s world acquires a fraught, risky erotic dimension; he’s gradually discovering his queerness.
In alternating scenes, “beyond space and time,” we fly into a disorienting, mapless desert, beyond the prairie horizon, into the vision of an ancient Edenic paradise in “the middle of the middle of the middle of the Middle East,” where the tree of forbidden knowledge grows under guard, but the view from the top is irresistible.
It amounts to a cosmology, a new origin mythology no less. And the play, I think, is about how competing mythologies collide, run parallel, and play out, in a love story infiltrated by tradition, and by the toxic inheritance of white colonization." - Liz Nicholls, 12thNight
Click here for the full response.