In Khawla Ibraheem’s ‘A Knock on the Roof,’ Humor Is a Constant Salve Amid the Horrors of War

Sometimes a tragedy involving a large number of victims can be made to seem more accessible by scaling it down to a single person — or a single actor, in the case of “A Knock on the Roof,” a blistering, roughly 80-minute play written and performed by a Syrian-Palestinian theater artist based in the Golan Heights, Khawla Ibraheem.Ms. Ibraheem conceived the play, which is set in Gaza and traces a stream of Israeli military operations, in 2014, when another war was raging in the territory. Yet it’s impossible to watch Ms. Ibraheem’s heroine, Mariam, describe these actions — bombings, which grow ever closer and more frequent — without thinking of the cataclysmic events that have unfolded there over the past 16 months. No specific time frame is given, though, and instead of looking at geopolitical factors, Ms. Ibraheem at once expands her focus to the horrors of war and narrows it to specific people and their community. We learn that Mariam’s husband is abroad, studying, while she cares for their young son. Mariam’s mother is a near-constant presence; in Ms. Ibraheem’s frequently comical depictions — she essentially plays all the family members, giving each a distinctive voice — the elder woman emerges as a loving but classically oversolicitous figure.Humor is a constant salve in “Knock,” in fact, as the playwright reminds us how everyday life, with its little pleasures and petty irritations, continues even in times of catastrophe. Mariam insists to the audience members — at a preview, Ms. Ibraheem interacted with several at different times — that she’s a “cool mom.” After literally running from her home to avoid an imminent bombing, she’s frustrated to realize that she left her phone charging. Khawla Ibraheem in ‘A Knock on the Roof.’ Joan MarcusAs Mariam explains early on, the play’s title refers to a small bomb that Israel’s forces drop to alert residents of an area that they have five to 15 minutes to grab a few essentials and evacuate before a full-scale rocket attack. It could be noted that this is still five to 15 minutes longer than Hamas provided on October 7, 2023, or than the notice allowed by your average suicide bomber. Of course, that doesn’t in any way diminish the terror that has been faced by men, women, and children trying to survive as larger forces conspire against them, and Ms. Ibraheem and her director, Oliver Butler, who helped develop “Knock,” capture that terror with a relentless visceral intensity. Whenever a bomb drops, Oona Curley’s lighting dims on Frank J Oliva’s nearly bare set — composed of a single chair and a brick wall — and we hear tense, ticking music as Ms. Ibraheem begins to run in place, breathlessly keeping track of time.Even in these moments, Mariam cracks jokes in an effort to maintain her sanity. “Now I know why Yasmeen keeps nagging me to hit the gym,” she quips in one instance, referring to a preachy neighbor as her chest and legs burn. Beyond injecting levity, such wisecracks remind us of the humanity of both survivors of war and casualties, who in the latter case are too often reduced to statistics.Eventually, we also get a sense of how Mariam, who tells us repeatedly of her desire to simply “act normal,” has sacrificed outside of war. It’s revealed that she met her spouse while studying to get a master’s degree. “I never wanted any of this,” she declares, not for the first time, but here her specifications are different: “Not a house, not a marriage, not a kid.”Mind you, this is partly her frustration and despair talking: When people and things we love are in constant danger, the logical response might well be to seek a sense of detachment. Whatever her ambitions were, or are, Mariam fiercely loves her husband, home, and child, and it’s this love that finally makes “A Knock on the Roof” so shattering, whatever your political perspective.

In Khawla Ibraheem’s ‘A Knock on the Roof,’ Humor Is a Constant Salve Amid the Horrors of War

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