Oslo (the play)

[YouOverThere]

"My daughter is named Maya" said Ahmed Qurie, PLO Finance Minister, to Uri Savir, Director General of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, upon learning that Savir had a daughter named Maya. In the 2017 Tony Award-winning play Oslo, this broke the ice after the first tense secret negotiating session between the PLO and an Israeli official that eventually culminated in the Oslo Accords. I love to complain about the quality of plays, in particular about award-winning plays, but Oslo is a really truly great play (so good - and so well-acted by the Bethesda-based Roundhouse Theatre Company - that I saw it 3 times).

Oslo tells the story of the Norwegian husband-and-wife team of Terje Rod-Larsen and Mona Juul, who conceived the idea of the secret negotiations and acted as facilitators. I don't know whether anyone else on this board who was alive at that time knew about them, but I did not. The play captures the spirit of what actually transpired, though it did take some liberties to make for better theater (underplaying the roles that the Norwegian Foreign Minister and Deputy Foreign Minister played so that the focus would be on Rod-Larsen and Juul, leaving one of the Palestinian negotiators out - my guess was that it would look better to the audience to have the same number of people on each side, and adding some fictional peripheral characters so that it wouldn't be a boring documentary).

Though Oslo is about a deadly serious subject, it has as many laugh lines as many comedies. This actually was intended to capture the spirit of the negotiations. Rod-Larsen had a theory of negotiations that he called "gradualism": put people from the 2 sides together, have them first agree on what they agree on before moving on, and let them learn that the people on the other side are also human. This last point required that everyone involved eat meals together and drink together (even members of the Norwegian security detail).

!!!Some might find the rest to be a spoiler!!!

 

The end result was that not only did the negotiators come up with the basis for the Oslo Accords, but they became friends - a quarter of a century later, Qurie and Savir still correspond regularly, as do the 2 Mayas.

The play ends with Mona Juul questioning whether what they did was right, given the number of people who died in the wake of the Accords. Rod-Larsen responds that at least they moved the sides a little closer to together, increasing the chance that some future negotiation might lead to peace.[

If this play is ever performed in your town, I heartily encourage you to see it.

Edited May 18, 2019 by YouOverThere

[YouOverThere]

P.S.  There is an attempt to make a movie version of the play. Capturing the same spirit might be difficult, as the play makes you feel as if you are in the room with the negotiators.

[dirac]

Quote

The play captures the spirit of what actually transpired, though it did take some liberties to make for better theater (underplaying the roles that the Norwegian Foreign Minister and Deputy Foreign Minister played so that the focus would be on Rod-Larsen and Juul, leaving one of the Palestinian negotiators out - my guess was that it would look better to the audience to have the same number of people on each side, and adding some fictional peripheral characters so that it wouldn't be a boring documentary).

Thanks for posting your review, YouOverThere. Yes, they probably did make some dramatic-license decisions to help the audience focus.