Desert Dreams

Department Of Theatre Arts School Of Performing Arts University Of Ghana, Legon

PRESENTS

Desert Dreams

SYNOPSIS

The play tells the story of five Ghanaian youth making the dangerous journey by road through the Sahara desert with the intent of reaching Europe. We have Amina, sexually-abused as a young girl who had the ambition of becoming an air hostess, turned a prostitute and now hoping to become a hot strip-tease in major European cities; Oklu, the Rastafarian and university graduate who pawned the family sacred statuette to pay for his passage hoping to return to change the system and lead his people out of bondage (zion); Mansa, the youngest of them who could not bear the constant abuse of her aged farmer husband and got help from Amina to run away from her matrimonial home hoping to find true love and happiness; Tetteh, the Bukom lad who got misled by a fake pastor to destroy the family sacred shrine and in addition lost his fiancé to him and in anger beat the pastor into pulp and escaped the grips of the law, he hopes to return to rebuild the shrine and pacify the offended gods by becoming the high priest; Atongi the cattle-boy from Paga who sold his father’s cattle and eloped with his lover who was then married to another man but has to abandon her to seek fortune in Europe hoping to return to marry her and live like royals. But then Haruna their paid guide deserts them in the middle of nowhere taking away their provisions and water. The group finds shelter in an isolated cave waiting for what fate has in store for them. Through a series of individual reminisces and outbursts as a result of personality conflicts, against the backdrop of a raging desert storm, we get some factors that compelled each of them to embark on this quest for “greener pastures”. One by one, as fate will have it, the desert swallows them up till the end when everything seemed a bad dream for all.

ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT

Yaw Asare, 1997 ACRAG Playwright of the Year Award Winner was for five years the Artistic Director of Abibigromma of the National Theatre during which time he wrote and directed several plays including Desert Dreams [1997]. At the time of his passing in August 2002, he was a Lecturer at the School of Performing Arts, University of Ghana, Legon. His outstanding achievements as a scholar and writer were recognised by the award of Kwame Nkrumah Prize for Excellence in African Studies at the University of Ghana, Legon, in 1992. His other major creative works include: Ananse in the Land of Idiots [1993], Leopard’s Choice [1993], Bride of the Gods [1996], Secrets of an Ancient Well [1998] and Sodom and Gomorrah [2001]

SIGNIFICANCE The issue of Ghanaian youth embarking on this dangerous trek through the desert in an effort to get to Europe is on the ascendancy with records of high fatalities. The European Union, the African Union as well as the United Nations have all been trying to find means of curbing the practice without success.

The play though written more than a decade ago still throws light on the issue of illegal migration in contemporary period. It is hoped that the production will bring to bear the danger associated with this quest for greener pastures abroad.

THE DIRECTOR

Mr. Africanus Aveh is currently a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Theatre Arts, School of Performing Arts, University of Ghana, Legon with production credits for both the screen and stage. His recent major stage production was Yaw Asare’s Ananse in the Land of Idiots – the grand finale of the Ghana@50 Theatre Classics at the National Theatre in December 2007.

PRODUCTION DETAILS

This is a Staff Production of the Department of Theatre Arts, School of Performing Arts, University of Ghana, Legon, scheduled for the Efua Sutherland Drama Studio, Legon from Thursday 18th February to Sunday 21st February and runs again from Thursday 25th to Sunday 28th February, 2010. The performance starts at 8pm each night.

ALL ARE CORDIALLY INVITED