Keyanna Khatiblou pays tribute to her Iranian father and English mother while recounting the events leading up to and after the Iranian Revolution of 1979 amidst a party attended by four of her closest friends in A Going Away Party Play, and if the playwright’s approach is too all-over-the-place to be entirely successful, there is still much to recommend in this Boston Court Pasadena World Premiere.

Khatiblou’s renamed stand-in is Mina (Mehrnaz Mohammadi), who has invited European-American Kate (Kodi Jackman), Iranian-American Ryan (Nathan Mohebbi), Latino-American Mateo (Giovanny Camarena), and Korean-American Debbie (Cindy Nguyen) to an evening of party games, family history, and ruminations on freedom, democracy, citizenship, race, and life in the U.S. following the 2016 elections, all of which adds up a lot for a playwright to tackle in ninety minutes.

One party game (“The floor is lava. Don’t touch the floor.”) has Mina and her guests comparing citizenship requirements in the U.S. with other countries. (It turns out it’s a lot easier to become a naturalized American than say a naturalized Spaniard, or even just to get a work visa in Spain.)

Another game has the guests shooting nerf guns at a “Democracy Target,” with the bulls-eye (“Pure Democracy”) extending outward to “Flawed Democracy,” “Hybrid Regime,” “Authoritarian Regime,” and “Actual Hell,” as Mina and friends debate which ring the U.S. now finds itself in.

And in “Zombie Apocalypse,” each guest must strategize the best way to survive said apocalypse.

“Freedom 101” has Mina recalling how life changed for her and her family after 9/11 and then again in 2016, and “Freedom 102” has U.S.-born Debbie expressing her frustration at having to “teach a whole audience full of people who I am specifically and also who I am within my culture,” and Ryan discussing how “my parents sacrificed so much for me to achieve the American dream only to learn that American exceptionalism is a myth.”

And I still haven’t come to the heart of A Going Away Party Play, which is a series of scenes that take us back in time to Mina’s parents’ (Mohebbi as Iranian Basir and Jackson as English Caroline) meet-cute in Cardiff, Wales, and their subsequent marriage and move to Iran where Basir learned that before he could begin working for the American company that had recruited him, he would need to complete two years of military service, hardly what a pregnant Caroline was expecting, nor did she anticipate sharing the family apartment with Basir’s mother Maman Bozorg (Nguyen) and his sister Niloofar (Mohammadi) as Iran moved towards a revolution that Niloofar was convinced would at last bring freedoms denied during the Shah’s long reign. (And was she ever wrong on that!)

Perhaps not surprisingly, there are more than a few tonal shifts along the way, though to his credit, ace director James Fowler keeps things lively throughout the show, as do his five actors in multiple roles and accents.

Though Mohammadi isn’t entirely convincing as someone who has lived since infancy in the U.S., her effervescent performance is the glue that holds things together.

Mohebbi is especially fine as Ryan, living his Iranian parents’ American dream to discover that “America is just a country,” and as a young Iran native met with an unpleasant surprise on his return to the country of his birth.

Jackman does engaging work as both the “all-American” Kate and an curiously Irish-sounding young Englishwoman who finds herself in over her head in a country that’s not her home; Nguyen is a standout as a contemporary Asian-American (her Debbie monolog is spot-on) and as a traditional Iranian housewife and mother; and Camarena is a gay delight as Mateo, though Khatiblou’s script doesn’t give the actor the meaty extra role that his castmates get to play.

A Going Away Party Play benefits enormously from the most fabulous of Boston Court production designs combining the talents of Stephen Gifford (set), Mylette Nora (costumes), Gavan Wyrick (lighting), Cindy Campos (properties), and John Nobori (sound and original music) to spectacular effect.

Camella Coopilton is production stage manager and Jasmine Leung is assistant stage manager. Keri Safran is dialect coach, Adrian Centeno is dramaturg, and Mehdi Faraji is cultural consultant.

Julia Flores is casting director. Sandra Kate Burck, Amir Kamali, Shereen Khatibloo, Evan Lugo, and Quyen Ngo are understudies.

There is much to be savored in Keyanna Khatiblou’s exhilarating, informative, and ultimately quite moving A Going Away Party Play. It ends up, however, a bit too ambitious for its own good.

Boston Court Pasadena, 70 N. Mentor Ave., Pasadena. Through November 1. See website for detailed performance schedule.
www.BostonCourtPasadena.org

–Steven Stanley
September 28, 2024
Photos: Brian Hashimoto