Head Over Heels in Saudi Arabia

A political project, highlighting the plight of Saudi women, but one that is hamstrung by its unquestioning acceptance of the value of decadent consumerism.

★★★
theatre review (edinburgh) | Read in About 2 minutes
Published 14 Aug 2013
33328 large
121329 original

It's safe to say that Head Over Heels in Saudi Arabia is not being staged with the aid of the Saudi Cultural Office.

The show's creator and performer, Saudi academic and theatre professional Maisah Sobaihi, sets out to make a point about the place of women in Saudi society through small vignettes from the lives of her friends and family. Sobaihi's stories are both tragic and entertaining. Her boundless enthusiasm compensates for an audience unwilling to get involved, perhaps in part because some of them have turned up expecting a Jim Davidson-style trip through the hilarity of state-sanctioned polygamy.

As Sobaihi illustrates, the situation for Saudi women is anything but hilarious. The shame of being abandoned for a younger woman, or being unable to drive to the shops without the help of an uncomprehending, underpaid immigrant driver show the absurdity of everyday reality for women in the country.

The show is let down only by Sobaihi's lack of awareness about Saudi social class and its treatment of Saudi decadence and consumerism as being relatively unproblematic. This is typified in the finale which finds a solution in a particularly American feminist individualism in which she falls in love with herself. It makes her characters less likeable despite obvious hardships.

Head over heels... is as informative as it is funny, and you have to admire its sincerity of purpose. It is a political project, highlighting the plight of Saudi women, but is hamstrung by a lack of self-awareness about the artificial dream-world it inhabits.