Written by Marcus Youssef, Guillermo Verdecchia and Camyar Chai

Directed by Guillermo Verdecchia

A co-production with Cahoots Theatre Projects, Toronto.

An elaborate agitprop theatrical collaboration where the internal contradictions and duplicitous double-speak of the "war on terror" are exposed as the propaganda vehicles for the neo-colonialism of the West that they are. "Ali Hakim" and "Ali Ababwa," refugees from the imaginary country "Agraba," attempt to seduce their audience into providing them with food, refuge, security, freedom and the material benefits of Western consumer society, failing miserably at every step.

Original Cast featured Camyar Chai, Marcus Youssef and Tom Butler (and subsequently John Murphy) Design by Marina Szijarto (set and costumes), Sharon Huizinga (lights), Alejandro Verdecchia (sound and music), Rob Lewis (properties), Richard Lawley (signs, graphics and pillowcases) and Andrew Laurenson (video). Stage Management by David Kerr.

Premiered at the Vancouver East Cultural Centre (Feb 10 - 14, 2004), with a subsequent tour to Theatre Passe Muraille (Toronto), Montreal Arts Interculturel/Teesri Duniya (Montreal), Magnetic North Festival (Edmonton), and remounted at the Frederic Wood Theatre, UBC (September 29 - 30). Ali and Ali has also toured to the Gateway Theatre in Richmond, BC (March 2006), and a South Coast Tour (May 2007) to Galiano Island, Pender Island, Victoria, North Vancouver and the U.S. premiere at On the Boards Theatre in Seattle, WA.)

Published script available from Talonbooks (www.talonbooks.com).

"A vicious and viciously funny satire of life in the New American Empire, Ali and Ali is a hilarious and eye opening evening of political theatre - extremely politically-incorrect political theatre."
- CBC Radio

"Need a reminder of how smart, relevant and entertaining live theatre can be? Then check out The Adventures of Ali & Ali And The Axes Of Evil."
- NOW (Toronto)

"What makes Ali and Ali more than the sum of its satirical-jibe parts as it takes aim at the inscrutability of U.S. foreign policy is its cunning ability to play by those very same rules to their expected devastating conclusions…"
- Globe and Mail

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER: "Diabolically funny" ...the funniest exposition of American foreign policy ever devised... The confrontations are little sketches depicting the horrors of being helped by American military power. Though Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine come to mind, the scenarios of destructive rescue in the Philippines, Cuba, Nicaragua and Chile provide distant background..."

THE SEATTLE TIMES: "out-Borats Borat" An often hilarious, sometimes repulsive and no-holds-barred lampooning of ... well, what do you got? How about Arab religious fanaticism, Israeli militarism, American colonialism and commercialism, and feel-good-but-phony theatrical multiculturalism? ... A warning to all: The humor can here can be crude, sexually graphic, profane or genuinely offensive.

SEATTLEST: "A Whole New World" In the course of that well-paced hour and a half, Ali and Ali ultimately bring democracy and freedom to the audience, in more ways than one. This is some phenomenally funny theatre.