Queens of Syria (the documentary) tells the story of fifty women from Syria, all forced into exile in Jordan,who came together in Autumn 2013 to create and perform their own version of the Trojan Women, Euripides’ timeless Ancient Greek tragedy about the plight of women in war. Not one of them had ever acted before.
What followed was an extraordinary moment of cross-cultural contact across millennia, in which women born in 20th century Syria found a blazingly vivid mirror of their own experiences in the stories of a queen, princesses and ordinary women like them, uprooted, enslaved,and bereaved by the Trojan War.
It was a process charged with emotion and fraught with challenges, as long buried issues came to the surface, and at times the project itself hung in the balance.
Yasmin Fedda’s subtly crafted and beautifully shot film explores the difficult choices the women have to make about appearing on stage, and the close relationships they form within the group as they explore with each other their experiences. It shows their bravery and determination that their stories should be told to the world.
The original production was invited to go on tour in the US and Switzerland, courtesy of Georgetown University in Washington DC, and Columbia University in New York, but sadly the casts visas were denied, so the tour was 'virtual' since unfortunately our original cast were unable to travel to the US as their visas were rejected. Listen here to the story on NPR. After we showed the trailer and some short clips from the documentary footage from 'Queens Of Syria', The inspirational cast of The Trojan Women received a standing ovation from a visibly moved Georgetown audience.Under the expert moderation and translation of Syrian broadcaster Honey Al Sayed, the cast, director and audience were able to have a discussion about the project, sharing experiences of participating in and of watching some of the performance. Despite thousands of miles and visa denials, the team at Georgetown enabled our cast to tell their stories and ask their questions, and gave the Washington audience a flavour of what (we hope!) is to come if visas are granted and a live performance is made possible.
You can discover more about the event in a report by Peter Marks in the Washington Post and also in a Foreign Policy article by Ambassador Cynthia Schneider, co-founder of the Georgetown Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics.
Geneva
The Talberg Institute also hosted nine of the cast members to mount an abridged version of The Trojan Women at CERN in Switzerland.
The original production was invited to go on tour in the US and Switzerland, courtesy of Georgetown University in Washington DC, and Columbia University in New York, but sadly the casts visas were denied, so the tour was 'virtual' since unfortunately our original cast were unable to travel to the US as their visas were rejected. Listen here to the story on NPR. After we showed the trailer and some short clips from the documentary footage from 'Queens Of Syria', The inspirational cast of The Trojan Women received a standing ovation from a visibly moved Georgetown audience.Under the expert moderation and translation of Syrian broadcaster Honey Al Sayed, the cast, director and audience were able to have a discussion about the project, sharing experiences of participating in and of watching some of the performance. Despite thousands of miles and visa denials, the team at Georgetown enabled our cast to tell their stories and ask their questions, and gave the Washington audience a flavour of what (we hope!) is to come if visas are granted and a live performance is made possible.
You can discover more about the event in a report by Peter Marks in the Washington Post and also in a Foreign Policy article by Ambassador Cynthia Schneider, co-founder of the Georgetown Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics.
Geneva
The Talberg Institute also hosted nine of the cast members to mount an abridged version of The Trojan Women at CERN in Switzerland.
The original production was invited to go on tour in the US and Switzerland, courtesy of Georgetown University in Washington DC, and Columbia University in New York, but sadly the casts visas were denied, so the tour was 'virtual' since unfortunately our original cast were unable to travel to the US as their visas were rejected. Listen here to the story on NPR. After we showed the trailer and some short clips from the documentary footage from 'Queens Of Syria', The inspirational cast of The Trojan Women received a standing ovation from a visibly moved Georgetown audience.Under the expert moderation and translation of Syrian broadcaster Honey Al Sayed, the cast, director and audience were able to have a discussion about the project, sharing experiences of participating in and of watching some of the performance. Despite thousands of miles and visa denials, the team at Georgetown enabled our cast to tell their stories and ask their questions, and gave the Washington audience a flavour of what (we hope!) is to come if visas are granted and a live performance is made possible.
You can discover more about the event in a report by Peter Marks in the Washington Post and also in a Foreign Policy article by Ambassador Cynthia Schneider, co-founder of the Georgetown Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics.
Geneva
The Talberg Institute also hosted nine of the cast members to mount an abridged version of The Trojan Women at CERN in Switzerland.
In 2013 Refuge Productions in partnership with Oxfam mounted a new production of Euripides’ great anti war tragedy the Trojan Women in Jordan with a cast of Syrian refugee women displaced by the war in Syria. The production was intended both as a psycho-social support measure for the participants, and as an advocacy tool to highlight the plight of Syrian refugees. The women who participated arrived at the workshops in varying states of suffering from depression, feelings of isolation and PTSD. Without claiming that the production cured these, the Syrian psychologist we employed to monitor the workshops and rehearsals confirmed that the process allowed the women to take back a great measure of self confidence and self respect, as well as finding a new support group through sharing each others’ stories and experiences. In 2013 the refugee crisis engulfing the region as a result of the civil war in Syria was very under-reported internationally. We correctly projected that showing this crisis in a different and dramatically surprising way would have a much wider impact in reporting terms, and as such the play was widely covered by regional and international press both in newsprint and on television.
Arwa's Story
Early Years
Arwa grew up in Yarmouk Camp, a so-called unofficial refugee camp, established by the Syrian government for Palestinians, just outside Damascus. According to UNRWA: ‘Before the war in Syria, it was home to around 160,000 Palestine Refugees, making it the largest Palestine Refugee community in the country and a key commercial hub known for its vibrant markets and affordable goods.'
The sign at the entrance to the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp outside Damascus now bears both the Palestinian and the revolutionary "Free Syria" flag, Feb. 14, 2025.
A UNWRA run school in Damascus
Arwa's family
Arwa’s grandfather Said, was born in Palestine during the British mandate, had a British passport.
Arwa's Family
A picture of Arwa’s family, from left to right: Her brother Lutfi, her mother Hala, Her sister Alaa, her father Ahmad, her brother Mohammad, and her grandmother Tamam.
Arwa’s uncle Mohammad, a palestinian politician, assassinated in 1983, a week after calling out corruption in the Fateh political party and defecting to Abu Moussa’s group.
Arwa's Journey
In 2016 the Lebanese government decreed that all Syrian refugees of Palestinian origins had to leave.
“But when we went back everything had been destroyed,” said Arwa. “There were so many checkpoints that it took six hours to drive what used to take 10minutes. One guy just shot in the air and said: ‘I can kill you if I want!’”
As an actress, Arwa was also pressured to support the Regime. Instead, she decided to flee – leaving a war zone, leaving behind her family, her home, her beloved dog, Jacko, her burgeoning acting career.
Being Palestinian whose family had fled to Syria in 1948, she still did not have legal citizenship in Syria. She chose the UK because she’d worked for the BBC, spoke English, and her Palestinian grandfather had had a British passport in the 1930’s.
She walked for weeks through Kurdistan, survived near rape, being shot at by the Turkish army; she swam and paddled a rubber dinghy across the river to Europe, before flying to claim asylum in the UK in 2018
Red: travelled by from Erbil to Turkey through mountains by foot or car
Black: travelled from Turkey to Greece through rivers - swimming or paddling
Green: travelled by aeroplane
Duration: 1 months and 25 days.
One of the many videos Arwa took documenting her journey walking from Syria to Greece in case she didn’t survive.
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Arwa the Actress
She graduated from the Higher Institute of Dramatic Arts, Acting Department, in Damascus, 2011.
In Syria, she appeared in several television series, including
Zaman Al-Barghout (Parts I & II)
Arouh Aria (Naked Souls)
Sarkhat Rouh (Soul's Cry)
She acted in the feature film The Last Friend and performed in theatrical productions such as Shakespeare’s Hamlet.
In Lebanon, she appeared in the television series Al Arrab, performed in the stage play Tachycardia, and participated in the BBC radio drama series Tachycardia.
Photos:
Arwa's Drama School Production
Hamlet
BBC Radio Drama
Arwa in London
After eleven months in the limbo of asylum, she’d got refugee status and, despite covid putting things on hold again, managed to build what seemed like successful life here. And yet, in a few short weeks, Arwa had lost her London home and job through no fault of her own.
“It was the worst thing that has ever happened to me, even worse than the war,” says Arwa. “I don’t even have trauma from my journey to the UK. I have homelessness trauma now. I still can’t believe that it happened.”
Arwa slept on the streets for several nights before the charity Streetlink found her a room in St Mungo’s hostel in late October 2022. Now she was completely alone, in a foreign country, apart from Jacko, her adored golden retriever, with whom Arwa had finally been re-united a few months later, by a British charity who had flown him to the UK.
Arwa and Jacko in 2022 living on the pavement outside Ealing Council
At an award ceremony in Ealing Council in which she was awarded ‘Asylum Seeker Ambassador’ for the work volunteering with various charities.
Arwa and the Trojan Women Project
Performing as Hecuba as part of the Trojan Women’s project.
She assisted in running the drama workshops with groups of refugees and asylum seekers and then, supported by casts of workshop participants, performed as Hecuba in various productions of The Trojan Women.
Listen to her story in her own words on her podcast
episode of Why am I in Your Country?
Arwa is now happily married to Jonathan who she met in a homeless shelter in London. Read their amazing story here - published for Valentine's day in the Daily Mail.
They have a son, Arthur!
