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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.

Washington DC

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.

Washington DC

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.

Washington DC

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.

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Flora Warrington
- Jan 31, 2022
- 1 min read

Trojans Community Drama Workshops and Tour

We're delighted to announce that we are starting work on a brand new project - a projected tour of a brand new play with community drama workshops in each location.

We will be creating a brand new production of Euripides’ great anti-war tragedy, The Trojan Women, with a cast of refugees and host community members – including a core of those who have been professional actors in their own countries.

We intend to tour this production and the accompanying drama workshops round the UK for refugees and host community members.

Alongside the brand new adaptation, we will be running a six weeks of multi-lingual weekly drama workshops with refugees and host community members in different regions of the country.

We're just putting together the three month pilot project at the moment - we're starting in London, W10, and partnering with the brilliant Dalgarno Trust.

So far we've raised £5,600 of the £32,000 we need for the pilot project. Any donations welcome!

More to come soon....

Recent Posts

TROJANS UK 23 - WORKSHOPS IN PROGRESS NOW! All refugees and asylum seekers welcome!

TROJANS UK 22 PERFORMANCE FILM

Our workshops from Trojans UK 22 continue into 2023! In case any of you missed it, we had a fantastic "sharing" performance at the Playground Theatre after our successful drama workshops of 2022. Watc

"I SURVIVED ONE WAR - I WILL SURVIVE ANOTHER!" Trojans UK at FT Festival 3.9.22

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