' RAS NOAH AND THE HAWK ' Comedy with a message of morality.

RAS NOAH AND THE HAWK is Jambiz International's latest contribution to the theatre scene and is now playing at the Centre Stage Theatre in New Kingston. The play is written by Patrick Brown and directed by Trevor Nairne, and while it manages to be funny, it is definitely a drama.

RAS NOAH AND THE HAWK

Imagine a dreadlock building a boat 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and about 45 feet deep in the middle of Cross Roads!

Seems preposterous, doesn't it? Well, playwright Patrick Brown doesn't think so. In fact, he seems to believe that if it could have happened in the time of Noah, it would have an even better chance now with the tremendous surges in technology.

But, that is the great thing about writing, especially playwriting: one can conceive the most impossible things and bring them to life onstage, and while the dreadlock might have been locked up in Bellevue and the keys thrown away for attempting to rebuild Noah's Ark, playwright Patrick Brown and his crew at Jambiz International should be laughing all the way to the bank this Christmas.

Oliver Samuels and Glen Campbell pair up again for this irredeemable comedy, Ras Noah and the Hawk, based on the Bible story of Noah and the Ark, which opens at the Centrestage Theatre in New Kingston on Boxing Day.

"It is a question of what if?" Brown explains his umpteenth play, which is set to be his umpteenth success.

"What if God is at the same stage now, as when he sent the flood? What if he believes that the level of decadence is a good enough case to start the earth all over again? What if he chooses the most unlikely person for his messenger: a humble Rastafarian building an ark in the middle of Cross Roads?" he said.

Wow! Just imagine that! Noah's boat was built to accommodate 50,000 species of animals and about one million species of insects, as well as his extended family, not to mention vegetation of all forms. And remember that this would be all that would be left after the flood.

But, Brown insists that what he really set out to do was to explore the subject, what if God is feeling today like he felt in Noah's time?

"I wonder how close we are to that, in light of the drugs and the killings. What if we are at the same stage now as it was then?" he asked.

And Ras Noah and the Hawk is loaded with many pertinent topics, as Brown uses it as a vehicle to explore subjects like: how did we reach a state of numbness to violence?

"I never saw a dead body until I was 18, nowadays children see dead bodies on the television news every night and it is like nothing any more," he added.

The burden of recreating Brown's whims onstage has been mainly the task of veteran director Trevor Nairne for years. But, Nairne says he had no problem transforming Noah's ark into Ras Noah's Hawk.

"No, not at all. Every artiste has used Biblical stories to parallel modern events at some time or the other, because the Bible is rich with these stories and artistes go there for inspiration," he said.

"My task as director is to become the eyes and ears of the audience, so that every time a member of the audience walks out of that theatre he will feel that his time was well spent.
That was all I set out to do," Nairne added. "I believe that while Ras Noah and the Hawk is a comedy if has what I call, the three 'Rs' - restoration, rejuvenation and redemption. It is a comedy with a message of morality."

Ras Noah and the Hawk features Campbell as Ras Noah and Samuels as his father, it also stars Dahlia Harris as Go Go, the community girl, as well as Kass Kass the narrator, David French as Spliff, a weed smoking ne'er do well and Loeri Robinson and Sharee McDonald-Russell alternating as Norma, Ras Noah's "empress."