Exploring queer Middle Eastern identity in Dummy in Diaspora - Chicago Reader

Dummy in Diaspora, like life, doesn’t present complete answers. The new solo play, written and performed by Esho Rasho, features a queer Middle Eastern coming-of-age story. Rasho, the Chicago-based actor and writer, wrote the one-person show in a fervor over three days in January as he navigated the uncertainties of postgrad life, the cancer diagnosis of a parent, and the strife of surviving as an artist under capitalism.

The semi-autobiographical play has had a somewhat unprecedented timeline to production, as Rasho was convinced by friends to submit it to companies around town. An improv theater replied the day after he submitted with deep interest and a question: could he get it on its feet in three weeks? Now it’s appearing this weekend at the Den prior to a run later this summer at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

I’m curious to hear what drew you to the arts and making things.

It was stories. I’ve always been drawn to stories. When I saw a production of The Wizard of Oz when I was five, there was something magical about witnessing a story about a place that wasn’t in the room we were in. I just knew I wanted to be a part of it. When I was ten, I searched up a children’s theater, and was like, “Mama, baba, please can I do this?” And they were confused but like, “OK?”

They just kind of would take me to rehearsals, and they didn’t really know what I was doing, but they just trusted it.

It can feel like such a gamble for us first-gen/second-gen artists to commit to the arts. I know my parents were also skeptical of that career path for me. But they still showed up.

Yeah, they were at every single one of my shows. My dad has not understood any one of my shows, but they still come and support me, and that’s really important to me.

I fell in love with stories and that love has evolved beyond college. I’m a storyteller at heart. I can’t not be. One of my favorite artists, Lorde, has this quote where she says she started seeing [her] life as art before [she] had any success. And I was like, oh my god. I feel like, especially in my adolescent years, I was witnessing my life like it was an art piece. It’s kind of cringey to say, but I think that’s how Dummy in Diaspora came about.

Dummy in Diaspora6/21-6/23: Fri-Sat 8 PM, Sun 7 PM; Den Theatre, 1331 N. Milwaukee, 773-697-3830, thedentheatre.com, $20.75

You’ve called this an autobiographical work, pulling from your own experiences growing up as a queer Middle Eastern kid. Can you tell me more about the desire to share these personal stories?

My parents are Middle Eastern Christians and so they used religion as a coping mechanism throughout their lives. They sort of pushed that on to me and my siblings growing up. But this led to absurd experiences growing up here in the U.S. [with] my unique identity.

Since the beginning of my acting training, I was really, really horrified and had this anxiety about what roles there would be for me. I knew I never wanted to play a terrorist role. I was really scared of the roles that I would get because I did not believe I could play a full, authentic human—being the way that I look, with this name, and the assumptions that come with me as an artist.

Dummy in Diaspora is my way of [centering] a full, authentic, real person in the identities that I [inhabit] in my everyday life on stage, and an attempt to not feel misunderstood.

The desire to be understood shows up in the core of this piece. Some of your stories center learning English as a second language and your initial struggles with it.

Yeah, I was gonna fail kindergarten because my English hadn’t progressed that year, and my mom fought the principal. She was like, “I know my son, he’s gonna do fine.” She fought so hard. My mom’s the first person in her entire family to go to college, so her English is better than her family’s, even if not the best. But she knows how to make her English good enough to tackle the American mind, and so I didn’t repeat kindergarten. But I did have to be in English [as a] Second Language classes up until I was in fifth grade.

I wonder how you see this solo play fitting in and beyond diaspora narratives.

What really struck me, or I guess surprised me, from previews was that people from completely different backgrounds than me said, “Oh, I saw myself in that.”

That’s exactly what I wanted to do as a writer, but I didn’t think that would be possible with the show because it’s such a specific story. But what I’m learning is that the most specific stories are the most universal also. There are parts of the story that are just human. There’s a human being looking for themselves, a human being trying to survive, a human being coping, a human being having fears—especially fears of aging, his body changing and fading. And then, there’s a part where he doesn’t want to be Christian anymore. That’s very much a Middle Eastern diaspora narrative. It’s specific, it’s cultural, but it’s also universal.

There’s a certain feeling of incompleteness here, too. The character Essa is maybe searching for answers about his identity and his future.

In life we never get complete answers, right? We’re not always going to get the answer that we want. Or, there’s a lot of unknown. That’s what I’m looking for. There’s a lot of unknowns in life. And I think this show presents Essa’s unknowns, and then you don’t necessarily get to hear some completes, the solutions.

I think the story’s really bigger than me. People were like, “You’re so funny, you’re so funny. You love this type of drama stuff but you make people laugh.” That’s fine, but what I want to do with my work is move people. I’m obsessed with honesty. I’m obsessed with raw truth. When I go into a theater—if I’m gonna leave my house to go to a theater instead of watching a TV show—I love seeing raw, ugly truth. I don’t try to make my writing pretty. I don’t try to be pretty on stage in the sense of, like, you know, like emotionally. Humans are imperfect. Humans do bad things. Sometimes humans can hurt people, and sometimes even hurt themselves. And those are the types of stories that I love. And I think Dummy in Diaspora is kind of an ugly story because I think I pulled off some inhibitions and wrote some truths that I was really scared to write.

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Reader reviews of Chicago theater, dance, comedy, and performance arts.

Yasmin Zacaria Mikhaiel: I can’t recall how I came across Dummy in Diaspora, but I clocked the Persian rug and chai in your marketing photos and was immediately pulled in, as I’m a part of the SWANA/Middle Eastern diaspora as well. Can you tell me about your roots in and beyond Chicago?Esho Rasho:I’m curious to hear what drew you to the arts and making things. It can feel like such a gamble for us first-gen/second-gen artists to commit to the arts. I know my parents were also skeptical of that career path for me. But they still showed up.Dummy in DiasporaYou’ve called this an autobiographical work, pulling from your own experiences growing up as a queer Middle Eastern kid. Can you tell me more about the desire to share these personal stories?The desire to be understood shows up in the core of this piece. Some of your stories center learning English as a second language and your initial struggles with it.I wonder how you see this solo play fitting in and beyond diaspora narratives. There’s a certain feeling of incompleteness here, too. The character Essa is maybe searching for answers about his identity and his future. We need to be upfront with you.We need to be upfront with you.We need to be upfront with you.We need to be upfront with you.We need to be upfront with you.