In Soldiers of Tomorrow, actor-playwright Itai Erdal's story of his Israeli army service triggers larger questions about conflict
In a one-man show that will “piss off both sides”, the theatre artist looks back on time in military with new eyes
Itai Erdal, in an image from his three-year stint of mandatory military service in Israel.
The Elbow Theatre and PuSh International Performing Arts Festival present Soldiers of Tomorrow at the Roundhouse Community Arts and Recreation Centre from February 3 to 5
ALMOST 30 YEARS after his mandatory military service in Israel, Vancouver theatre artist Itai Erdal is still awoken by nightmares about that part of his life.
“I still have dreams where people shoot at me and my gun jams and I can’t shoot back,” he tells Stir. “I realized you cannot go through three years of military service and not be scarred, not have it affect you. It’s just not possible.”
Now, Erdal is turning those experiences in the Israeli Defence force, serving in Lebanon and Palestine, and the questions that still haunt him into a one-man play, called Soldiers of Tomorrow.
The title is drawn from the day when his eight-year-old Israeli nephew came home from school with a box to fill with goods for soldiers on the frontlines. On it, the teacher had written “To the soldiers of today from the soldiers of tomorrow.” When Erdal was young, Israelis spoke of a time when there might be peace—and no need for conscription of all Jewish 18-year-olds—a goal that, amid rising conflict, he says now seems impossible.
“When I was in the army, I felt like I was doing the right thing,” Erdal recalls. “Like my mother said, ‘If you go, you can be kind to people.’ And so I thought I would be the one soldier who’s gonna be nice to everyone. And only when I was there I realized all that people see when they see me is a guy in a uniform with a gun. They don't know that I’m nice. They don't care if I’m for them. I’m still oppressing them! They don't care if I’m conflicted about what I’m doing. I'm still the person who’s stopping their life from being normal.
“Only after years of living in Canada, it became so clear to me that what I did was wrong,” he reflects. “I think it takes a lot of perspective; you have to get out in order to see it.”
By now it should be clear that Erdal holds some strong opinions about the conflict in Israel. The recent election of right-wing forces has only made the situation worse, he says.
Developing the play about the topic has been a years-long process. He cowrote it with theatre artist Colleen Murphy over several years, and right through the pandemic, first as an eight-person play, and then scaled back to a one-person rendition, with Erdal taking centre stage. In retrospect, with material he fully predicts to “piss off both sides” of the debate, he concludes that was the right decision.
“By keeping it a one-person show, I am playing a lot of the characters, four or five characters in the show, but it's all through me,” he says. “So I’m a storyteller and I’m comfortable in that realm.
“But also it’s a very political play. I feel very strongly about what's happened in Israel,” he adds. “And I feel strongly, as a person who was in the army, who helped oppress Palestinians, in a way, I feel a moral obligation to tell people what is happening in Palestine. If I was to hire other people to play the parts, they don't have my perspective, they don't have my history, they haven't served in the army. And so in a way that's why I am the best vessel for this: because I went through this personally.”
Throughout, Erdal moves from moments in his military service—harrowing checkpoints, surreal mock battles, disorienting shots in the night—to wider reflections on why he came to Canada and the root of strife in the Middle East.
Erdal, best-known as a Jessie Award-winning lighting designer who has worked around the world, has assembled an A-list team for the production. Anita Rochon directs, with a live score by Syrian musician-composer Emad Armoush. The lighting will be done by Erdal’s mentor, Alan Brodie. The striking design includes a painting backdrop that resembles a map of the contested areas of Israel and masses of green World War II toy soldiers.
Erdal welcomes the arguments the show might trigger.
“I think controversy is okay,” he asserts. “If people hear about the play and maybe more people know what is happening in Palestine, that is not a bad thing.”
The artist’s storytelling on stage has long bridged his birthplace in Jerusalem and his home in Vancouver. In Chop Theatre’s deeply personal How to Disappear Completely, he drew on his own pictures and film footage to recount his journey to Israel to spend his mother’s last months with her as she died from lung cancer. With his own company, The Elbow Theatre, he staged This Is Not a Conversation, digging into more incendiary subject matter: in it, he and Lebanon-born Palestinian multidisciplinary artist Dima Alansari joined together onstage to explore the complex conflict between their homelands. In the talkbacks that happened each night, he became used to drawing the ire of fellow Jewish people in the audience.
Erdal bridges the space between Canada and Israel in this play, too. He quotes a line in which he addresses the audience: “I know this subject intimidates many Canadians. I have seen the glazed look in their eyes. I’ve had many people ask me about the conflict and within a minute they’re searching for the exits. I've also seen many people twist themselves into pretzels in order not to take sides because they're so concerned about being anti-Semitic.”
“People don't understand what’s happening there,” he says. “They think its just a bunch of crazy people killing each other and they don't want to take sides. Particularly they don’t want to side against the Jews who have suffered so much. So me as a Jewish person who loves Israel and all my loved ones live there and I’m very proud to be Jewish: I can criticize Israel without being anti-Semitic. My goal is that they can criticize Israel, too, without concern of being anti-Semitic.”
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