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BEFORE THE SKIES WERE NAMED

A DRAMA IN TWO ACTS

BY DAVID LAWRENCE CADE

CATHERINE: Catherine Carlisle, a BBC reporter

ABDUL: Abdul Rahman Hammad, a young Iraqi, Catherine’s interpreter. He lives in the marshlands in southern Iraq.

MELINDA: Melinda Ellen Kramer, an American divorcee working with the World Food Relief Organization

FOUAD: Fouad Hammad, Abdul’s younger brother

ROLLAND: Lieutenant Rolland, a young U.S. army officer

ROBERTS: Major Roberts, commander of the local military units

AMAL: Amal Latifah Ermil, a village woman

Act One. Catherine Carlisle, a BBC TV reporter, and her interpreter, Abdul Rahman Hammad, are at a roadside in the marshlands near Nasiriyah on Sunday, February 1, 2004. Abdul is a young Iraqi who returned to the marshes in 2003 to help his parents and brother Fouad, who had tried to survive in the area after the draining of the swamps during the Baathist regime.

Catherine is investigating an incident from two days earlier in which it is alleged by villagers that American troops fired on unarmed Iraqis in a car, killing them. Melinda Ellen Kramer, an American with the World Food Relief Organization, has been coordinating aid work in the villages in the district. She arrives to describe a car bombing that has just occurred up the road near a military checkpoint.

Lieutenant Rolland with the U.S. army comes to ask that Abdul help translate, as the villagers are quite upset at the violence that has shattered the idyllic calm that had settled upon the marshes, which were beginning to be restored after the 2003 war. Fouad comes to ask Catherine to go see what is happening at the confrontation between villagers and the military.

Melinda and Fouad talk about the peace they had been enjoying out in the marshlands, quite shattered by the day’s events. They discuss ancient Sumer, the ziggurats, and the tribulations wrought by the occupying power. Catherine and Abdul return with news that Fahd Hammad, an uncle, has been detained. Abdul and Fouad leave to find out what is happening to Fahd, a tribal sheikh.

Major Roberts comes to inspect the site of the shooting incident and talks with Melinda and Catherine, brushing aside their concerns about Fahd. Amal, a village woman, secretly tells Roberts that she saw Lieutenant Rolland shooting the unarmed men in the car. He promises to file a report.

Act Two, Scene One, which begins that evening, has Amal and Melinda trying to find hope in the stars. Catherine joins them to discuss the mounting tension in the district. Abdul and Fouad return from Nasiriyah to report that their uncle had been tortured by the Americans and is in a hospital. They are enraged. Major Roberts arrives to inform the civilians that there is to be a curfew beginning at nine p.m., due to the day’s bombings and detentions.

Fouad, alone on stage at the end of scene one, makes a clear vow of attacking the Americans by blowing himself up.

Scene Two, near dawn the next day, sees Melinda and Amal scanning the skies for a constellation that had fascinated them the night before, one shaped like a crescent. Catherine and Abdul arrive to say that there is a BBC film crew on the way, to record what the villagers claim has been happening. Roberts arrives and informs Abdul that his brother Fouad has blown himself up an hour earlier outside a guard house at the U.S. army tent camp, also killing Rolland. Abdul tries to comfort himself at the shock. Catherine and Melinda offer their help in bringing the news to his parents.

Synopsis – BEFORE THE SKIES WERE NAMED

David Lawrence Cade Copyright 2004 by

All rights reserved