By Ernest Kearney — British Comedian and Playwright Henry Naylor set off to Afghanistan to gather material for his play Finding Bin Laden, and somewhere along the way found his own humanity. This is the core of Naylor’s provocative, enlightening and eventually damning new work Afghanistan is Not Funny which may also be the only play to come out of HFF22 that I would qualify be mandatory viewing.
Naylor’s reason for setting off to Afghanistan to conduct research for a show, mirrors the callousness and egotism of the Globe’s developed nations, and its inability to relate to the suffering of others except in terms of its own inconvenience.
Today this attitude is expressed in the aggravation felt by many Americans at the price of gas reaching five dollars and above, insensible to the suffering of the Ukrainian people in whose defense these hikes in prices are for.
Naylor’s tale of his journey is aided by the photos of his travelling companion Sam Maynard whose black and white compositions manage to capture a conflict that is anything but.
In the end, it is Naylor’s growing realization of the suffering of the Afghan people and especially Homayon, their guide, through this troubled land that brings about an expansion of his own humanity which in turn challenges his audience to consider the need to expand their own.
A PLATINUM MEDAL
Afghanistan is not Funny
Played During Hollywood Fringe Festival 2022
Photos by Rosalind Furlong
Learn More at henrynaylor.co.uk