The Mother of Kamal at Upstairs at the Gatehouse

Dina Ibrahim for KFI Publishing presents
The Mother of Kamal

Written by Dina Ibrahim
Directed by Stephen Freeman

It is 1948 in the slums of Baghdad. A working-class Jewish mother, Um-Kamal, finds her two sons arrested by the feared and loathed Secret Police. Inexplicably, the younger brother, Sasson, gets imprisoned, while Kamal, the older, is set free. Rumour and intrigue ensue, and Um-Kamal is reluctantly drawn into the orbit of the Communist Party, risking all to save her teenage sons and hold her rapidly fragmenting family together.

Decades later, conflicting family histories and narratives emerge, as the troubled Kamal finally faces a reckoning with the truth of what really happened following that night in the cells in Baghdad – and its impact on the family across time and space.

Following a sold-out run at the 2023 Camden Fringe, writer Dina Ibrahim brings a new, extended full-length telling of this powerful, poignant, warmly humorous, gently satirical, and intriguing piece of personal family history. Blending traditional narrative drama with elements drawn from classical, physical, epic and ensemble theatre, this is “theatre of the soul to sustain us… A symphony of survival” (International Times).

“Surges with passion… intersperses beautifully judged comedy with the weightier elements of the piece.”
Morning Star

“Crafts a Middle Eastern tale that unravels a web of secrecy [and] guilt.”
Fringe Biscuit

“Dina Ibrahim’s writing shines. This is a show deeply passionate about the story it is telling, ambitious in both scope and form.”
London Pub Theatres Magazine