Saba Monologue Festival

On September 2025, Montreal audiences will experience The Destroyed, a multilingual, multimedia performance running September 12–14 at Concordia’s Black Box Theatre, EV Pavilion. Performed in English, Persian, and French, the production is inspired by Naqqāli—the traditional Iranian art of dramatic storytelling—and reimagined through a postmodern short story by acclaimed Iranian writer Aboutorab Khosravi.

The Destroyed tells the tale of a writer who repeatedly attempts to erase the worlds they create, unable to control the lives of their characters. By weaving Iranian performance traditions with contemporary theatre, the piece creates dialogue between Montreal’s art scene and the rich legacy of Iranian theatre.

Guiding the project is director Syd Hamidreza Hosseini, a Montreal-based theatre practitioner whose work merges Iranian storytelling with technologies such as AR/VR and site-specific digital performance. “We are not trying to imitate the aesthetics of mainstream theatre,” says Hosseini. “Instead, we are building our own theatrical language—as immigrants, as multilingual artists, and as individuals carrying our traditions and mediums into dialogue with one another.”

The production is created collectively under the principle that performance is a human right, belonging to everyone—not just institutions or markets. It brings together artists from theatre, film, sound, and visual art whose distinct practices shape the work. Produced by Saba MediaS, a collective of Iranian artists in Canada, The Destroyed connects Iranian culture with the experience of migration while creating space for new voices.

The production is produced by Shadi Yazdani and Syd Hamidreza Hosseini, who also directs. Shahab Nezamdoost serves as dramaturg, Rebecca Acone provides video art, and Kamyar Karimi designs sound. The ensemble of performers includes Saina Alikhani, Pani Bolbolabadi, Nastaran Pourtaherian, Amir Pakdel, Parsa Sahidian, and Shadi Yazdani. Additional collaborators include Masoud Pakdel (photography), Hamed Sadatbarikani (stage manager), Krystian Erlindo Sosa (videographer), Amirhossein Zarifian (graphic design), Raphaëlle Behar (media relations manager), and Mina Bahra (assistant director).

Performance & Ticket Information
The Destroyed will play at Concordia’s Black Box Theatre, EV Pavilion (1515 Saint-Catherine St W, #1428, -3 Floor) from September 12–14 at 7 p.m. Tickets are $25 early bird and $30 general admission, available at sabamedias.com/event/the-destroyed.

In the vast and often male-dominated canon of classical theater, few female characters are as misunderstood—or as silenced—as Jocasta. Best known as the mother and wife of Oedipus in Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, Jocasta has long been a tragic footnote in a male hero’s downfall. But what happens when we shift the spotlight? What truths emerge when Jocasta herself speaks?
In recent years, contemporary feminist theater has begun to reclaim and reimagine figures like Jocasta—not as supporting characters to men’s stories, but as fully realized individuals with agency, pain, power, and voice. This reclamation is not only artistic but deeply political. It asks us: whose version of truth has endured? Whose silence has served as the backdrop for another’s tragedy?

Reframing Jocasta

In traditional tellings, Jocasta is defined by her relationship to Oedipus—mother, wife, queen. Her narrative is shaped by shame and fate, and her death is quick and symbolic. But feminist reinterpretations dive deeper: What was Jocasta’s internal world? What did she know—and when? What were her desires, her grief, her resistance?
To “experience the power of Jocasta” is to experience the awakening of a voice that has been buried under centuries of patriarchal storytelling. In modern reinterpretations, she is no longer a passive participant but a fierce witness to the injustice of prophecy and male pride. Her story becomes one of stolen agency and the desperate search for truth in a world that denies it to women.

Voice as Resistance

Reclaiming Jocasta is also about reclaiming voice—the central instrument of theatrical power. Voice is how truth survives, how it is passed down, how it challenges systems. Feminist theater gives Jocasta that voice, not to rewrite mythology, but to retell it honestly. This act becomes resistance—against silence, against shame, against being written out of one’s own life.
In these retellings, Jocasta may not escape her fate, but she owns her story. She speaks. She rages. She mourns. And perhaps most importantly—she remembers. Her voice reverberates with the echo of all silenced women in history, reminding us that reclaiming truth begins with reclaiming narrative.

Conclusion

“Experience the Power of Jocasta” is more than a tagline—it is a call to reimagine. Through a feminist lens, Jocasta becomes more than a character: she becomes a symbol of reclamation. By giving her space, stage, and voice, we don’t just rewrite her ending—we begin to write a new beginning for how women are seen, heard, and remembered in the world of theater and beyond.