‘Andy Warhol in Iran’ at Beck Center Explores Poignant Themes with Bluntness

“Everyone has something special about them, you just need to look hard enough.”

Contrary to what you might believe, this quote wasn’t pulled from the motivational poster hung in a classroom or office space, although you’d be forgiven for thinking so. No, this is an example of the trite dialogue utilized so often in “Andy Warhol in Iran,” currently at the Beck Center for the Arts.

While audiences might agree or resonate with a message behind a theatrical piece, the way in which that message is delivered is vitally important. In the case of “Andy Warhol in Iran,” the messages are relevant, but the script is heavy-handed and lacks nuance.

In 1976, Andy Warhol was summoned to Tehran, Iran–a country balancing on the knife’s edge of revolution–to capture portraits of Shah Pahlavi and his wife, Empress Farah. He is at the Tehran Hilton, ordering another round of cheap caviar, when the employee who delivers his meal pulls out a gun. This revolutionary, Farhad, plans to kidnap the famous artist and use the subsequent publicity to shine a light on the corruption, injustice and violence of the Iranian leaders. As Farhad awaits the arrival of his companions so that they may steal Warhol away, the artist and the revolutionary get to know one another through conversation.

Warhol’s visit to Iran may be the basis of the show, but the plot involving Farhad is fictitious. Playwright Brent Askari’s script theoretically asks: What if the father of pop art, a man who painted the rich, famous and powerful, was forced to confront a victim of the subjects he paints? Director Sarah May tries to tackle this question in Beck Center for the Arts’ Studio Theatre, but the script hampers her success.

Actor Scott Esposito as Warhol certainly looks like the artist, donning a platinum blonde wig, sunglasses and a blazer (courtesy of costume designer Tesia Dugan Benson), but his Warhol is not the quiet, aloof and mysterious man the world has seen in interviews, or the man that those who knew him in private have described. While Esposito’s Warhol is out-of-touch, self-absorbed and awkward, it’s difficult to bridge the gap between the flamboyant, chatty character on the stage and the real man he is based upon.

Kareem Mchaourab, who plays the fictional Farhad, has more freedom with his character. Mchaourab is emotional, passionate and often flush with anger, frustration and fear, all of which is fitting for the young, abused kidnapper who is desperate for change.

As Warhol and Farhad spend time trapped in a hotel room together (an authentic space intelligently designed by Cameron Michalak), they discover similarities between their lives and the trauma they’ve experienced. It comes as no surprise when they begin to feel empathy for one another.

Warhol’s life never feels as if it is in actual danger, despite passionate performances accompanied by dramatic shifts in lighting (designer Jeff Lockshine). Warhol’s irreverence toward the life-threatening situation may lead to many chuckles, but it does not help reinforce the sincerity of the danger he faces. As audience members, the question we are asking is not whether Warhol will survive, but what happens to the characters after this ordeal? Ultimately, Farhad’s journey is satisfying–Warhol’s is disappointing.

If you enter this play knowing nothing about Warhol or Iran, don’t worry–the show will provide you with its own version of a summarized Wikipedia article.

Instead of strategically revealing information about the time, place, characters and social circumstances through dialogue or context clues, the main narrative is paused while characters provide laborious exposition in glorified lectures. Although accompanied by attractive projections (designer Mike Tutaj), these asides are not just contrived, but also over-explanatory and repetitive.

For example, while trying desperately to plead his case and soothe his volatile captor, Warhol reveals that art was all he did while stuck in bed for a year as a child. This is quite an intriguing bit of information, a thread that can be tugged at and unraveled through dialogue and character interactions. Instead, Warhol flat-out tells the audience in a separate aside that he was bedridden when he suffered from rheumatic fevers as a child, and art was his escape.

This is just one instance of the problem consistent in Askari’s script: it underestimates the audience. Audiences do not need to have everything explained both in a monologued history lesson, then again in the narrative. Audiences also do not consistently need to be fed matter-of-fact lines of dialogue to bluntly state the message that a playwright is trying to convey. The quote at the top of this review is one such example, but the show is weighed down by many more instances of hackneyed dialogue, such as “In art…everything is possible.”

The play does have its redeemable moments, like when Warhol and Farhad reveal scars to one another, when Farhad recites his poetry or when Warhol compares revolutions to his pop-art: both of which are marketable, profitable and repetitive. One just wishes these moments occurred with more frequency.

Art is most powerful not when it tells you what to think, but when it poses questions and allows you to come to your own conclusions. “Andy Warhol in Iran” tells us that we are more alike than we are different, that art has a role in politics and we all have an ethical responsibility to be aware of injustices perpetrated upon fellow humans. Unfortunately, it does not trust the audience to digest these themes on our own; instead, we are spoon-fed them, which rather diminishes the overall meal.

“Andy Warhol in Iran” runs through November 2 at the Beck Center for the Arts Studio Theatre,

17801 Detroit Ave, Lakewood. Tickets can be purchased by calling (216) 521-2540 or by visiting beckcenter.org, $15-43.