Society is the murderer in new film Suddenly Slaughter at The Cinematheque, October 10
Work by The Biting School’s Aryo and Arash Khakpour incorporates a previous dance-and-theatre production of the same name
Suddenly Slaughter.
The Biting School’s Suddenly Slaughter screens at The Cinematheque on October 10 at 7 pm
BROTHERS ARYO AND Arash Khakpour, both born and raised in Tehran, Iran, created an interdisciplinary stage performance in 2019 called Suddenly Slaughter.
Produced by The Biting School, the dance-and-theatre company where the siblings are artistic directors, the show set in an impoverished communal house in Tehran pulls its inspiration from a 1971 Iranian play. The house’s tenants shift between a variety of emotions—curious, envious, hateful—when a new roommate enters the picture with a large suitcase that’s believed to be filled with money.
The original Suddenly Slaughter production makes up the basis for The Biting School’s new film of the same title, screening at The Cinematheque. It adeptly weaves re-created snippets of the play’s plot with scenes of a fictional immigrant director navigating the show’s tough rehearsal process. In a parallel turn of fate, both the new roommate and the director suffer from their surrounding society’s hold on them.
Aryo plays the director in the film, which also features performances by Arash, Ashley Aron, Elissa Hanson, Victor Mariano, Anahita Monfared, and Sadreddin Zahed.
The original play by Abbas Nalbandian is based was translated into English by Aryo. The film is ultimately a convergence of Iranian and Canadian cultures, and moves through themes of greed, patriarchy, religion, loneliness, and exclusion through an immigrant lens.
The Biting School is a company-in-residence at the Annex this year, and previously held the same role at PuSh International Performing Arts Festival from 2019-20, and The Dance Centre from 2018-19.
More details on their upcoming projects are here.
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