Dirty Paki Lingerie
nytheatre.com review by Amy Lee Pearsall
July 16, 2011
Six Pakistani-American women come together to air their mental and emotional laundry in Dirty Paki Lingerie, Aizzah Fatima’s one-woman show currently showing at the Abingdon Theatre Arts Complex as part of the Midtown International Theatre Festival. In this collection of monologues taken to invisible scene partners, Fatima’s bevy of women consult and confess their hopes and fears about their futures, finding a husband, upcoming arranged marriages, and unions that didn’t turn out quite as planned.
For a culture that continues to embrace the orchestrated relationship over marrying for love, these are timeworn issues; the difference here is that Dirty Paki Lingerie takes place in the Information Age. A vibrant young Pakistani visiting America combs Facebook looking for a rich Pakistani doctor to marry. A mother digs through the listings on the not-entirely-facetious MuslimMatrimony.com for her daughter’s future intended. A feminist Muslim on the eve of her nuptials is torn between the high score on her MCAT exam and whether or not it would be considered halal for her to wear a negligee for her husband on their wedding night. In this world, dreams of Harvard and law school clash with potential mates who don’t like their women “too educated,” and successful, westernized women who turn to instant messaging for introductions find themselves worthy of “sexting” but not good enough in the traditional sense to be considered marriage material.
Under the guidance of director/developer Erica Gould, Fatima opens and closes the piece in voiceover as a poet who dreams of a beautiful clean city with big buildings, large windows and a garden. In pursuit of forging her dream home, she turns to housework to finance bricks for construction and abandons her poetry. Years later, she finds herself with only a wall and can’t remember why she wanted it to begin with. Lighting designer Evan True takes advantage of these lyrical moments to create shadows on the mostly bare stage and illuminate Fatima in silhouette.
In basic black, the empathetic Fatima embodies these women with the aid of an emerald green hijab that also serves as a scarf and a sash, depending on who inhabits her at the moment. A large pair of sunglasses comes into play towards the end with the character of Lubna, a 50-something Pakistani-American mother meeting with her college-aged daughter for lunch. After years of marriage to a man who was substituted for her original betrothed two days before her wedding, Lubna has asked him to move out so she may live on her own terms. The sunglasses stay on for the duration—at first somewhat distracting as they mask so much of her face—but Fatima deftly wipes away a single tear out from under the regal lenses and you understand the depth of this woman’s emotion and feelings of liberation. Sound designer Scott O’Brien creates the world of the café with the sound of customers and the occasional clanking silverware but unfortunately the track ran out well before the monologue was completed.
With the show clocking in at just about an hour, I was flabbergasted that late seating continued half an hour into this one-act. With a single entry into the theatre, people dodged across the thrust stage to get into open seats, in one case almost running into Fatima even as she stayed in character and ignored the fourth-wall intruders. I might suggest to the house staff that a cue be taken from another well-known theatre festival in town and limit late seating not only for the safety of the patrons, but also for the safety of the performers.
As a sum of its enjoyable parts, Dirty Paki Lingerie offers more heft than an appearance of frilly camisoles and garter belts might suggest. Aizzah Fatima offers honest portraits of believable women who long for full, happy lives. “A lot of wishes have come true but it is still not enough,” the poet muses as Fatima sits upstage, illuminated as a Pakistani-American everywoman quietly battling the confines of culture and tradition. If you have the opportunity, see this production and take a moment to consider what lies beneath.
