Last Scene Underground: An Ethnographic Novel of Iran by Roxanne Varzi (review)

Last Scene Underground draws the reader's attention to the devastating repercussions of the post-1979 revolutionary period for secular people and the upper-middle classes in Iran; the traumatic aftereffects of the 1980–88 Iran-Iraq War; and the 1999 and 2009 student uprisings and their violent quashing by the government. In addition to the theme of postrevolutionary trauma, Varzi explores the lack of artistic freedom and freedom of expression in contemporary Iranian society. Last Scene Underground considers the risks taken by writers, playwrights, directors, and actors as they practice their art in a heavily censored environment where government agents scrutinize every performance and shut most of them down.

The story begins with an incident that effectively conveys the atmosphere of fear and oppression in which the protagonists negotiate their everyday lives. Leili, a student at the University of Tehran, waits anxiously to pass through the gates to campus. A long line forms behind another young woman wearing a flamboyant pink headscarf who stubbornly refuses the directive to remove her nail polish. A student jokes that the authorities should hurry up and arrest her so that the rest of them can get to their classes. The scene illustrates Iranians' witty coping strategies, including making light of state attempts to control their attire, comportment, and thoughts.

When Leili arrives at her Islamic morals class a few minutes late, she finds herself suddenly compelled to contradict the required answer to a question posed by her professor: "When is it appropriate for a layperson to interpret a spiritual leader's decrees?" "Leili knows the answer is 'Never.' She glances down at her notebook and shifts in her seat. Her chest thumps. She fingers her gold chain, feeling for the delicate cross beneath her shirt. The cross beats back and forth against her chest like an out-of-whack pendulum or fleeting prayer… and she whispers, 'Always.' There's a collective gasp from the room" (5). Instead of providing the rote state-sanctioned answer, Leili surprises herself as well as her classmates with her bold transgression, thus setting the stage for transgressions to follow.

Leili's outburst catches the attention of a classmate, Hooman, of whom she is initially wary, since he sports a style of beard associated with the religious class. Despite her efforts to avoid him, fearing that he will report her to the authorities, she runs into him on a weekend hiking trip to the mountains in northern Tehran. She discovers that he is not a government snitch but an avid reader of poetry. He invites her to Café Naderi, the famous haunt of poets and artists before the revolution. Arriving at the café, she meets Nima and Arezoo, actors in Hooman's experimental and subversive underground play, and they persuade her to join the cast. As Hooman writes in his director's notes: "My play will use banned texts and banned bodies and banned minds and courageous actors. Which is why Leili's risky outburst caught my attention in class" (33). The rest of the book describes the creative process of Hooman's underground theater production, as well as the budding romance between him and Leili.

Varzi bookends each chapter with Hooman's director's notes. Her narrative is inter-textual and self-referential, the principal intertext being experimental Polish theater director Jerzy Grotowski's Towards a Poor Theatre (1968). Grotowski's radical theory of theater asserts that actors must exert themselves, performing acrobatic exercises, and that audience involvement is a critical part of performance. Grotowski's method does not require props or a traditional stage, subverting many of the accepted theater norms. The method lends itself well to cultural and artistic contexts circumscribed by totalitarian governments and accounts for the popularity of this avant-garde theater in Iran before and after the 1979 revolution.

Hooman's theater group eventually performs in Iran and is predictably shut down on opening night, but not before receiving an invitation to perform in...