Chicago Tribune - Recommended
"...In “Selling Kabul,” the playwright Sylvia Khoury homes in on a recurring phenomenon of U.S. geopolitics in troubled areas of the world: the need for informants and fixers on the ground. That, of course, begs the question of what happens to such collaborators if they are discovered, including after the Americans leave. Most often, they’re at great risk. And this is hardly an issue limited to U.S. involvement. According to a report by the Associated Press, Palestinian militants in a West Bank refugee camp shot and killed two alleged enemy collaborators just last November."
Chicago Sun Times - Highly Recommended
"...Running through Feb. 25 at Skokie’s Northlight Theatre, “Selling Kabul” is more than a rip-roaring one-act that will have your heart rate increasing until the final blackout. As it plays out in real time among four characters in a single room in Kabul, Khoury’s narrative canvas encompasses decades of war and three generations of an Afghani family trapped by it."
Chicago Reader - Highly Recommended
"...Ahmed is a powerful actor in the role of Taroon. We can feel his ache for freedom and family, a deep-seated inner conflict in opposition to his need for connection with his sister Afiya (Aila Ayilam Peck). Peck, too, offers us a deft demonstration of emotional range. Both Ahmad Kamal as Afiya’s husband, Jawid, and Shadee Vossoughi as her cousin Leyla cap this incredible performance of verisimilitude. Selling Kabul is a much-needed reminder to our present-day selves that nothing we do is in a vacuum."
Chicago Stage and Screen - Highly Recommended
"...This is not a story that will give you a good feeling about being part of this war machine: it brings the battle and its unintended consequences and collateral damage down to the ground and into a small apartment where simple lives are trying to be lived. But it will speak to the ultimate humanity of some people in the face of the terrible things people can do to each other. It asks: what is the price of love?"
Let's Play Theatrical Reviews - Highly Recommended
"... Selling Kabul moves leisurely, but it's an intricating thrill ride of emotional intrigue that provides a gut punch to your emotions — making you wonder, will this family ever see each other again? Or will we honor our commitment and leave no one behind?"
Around The Town Chicago - Highly Recommended
"...In this 90 tense minutes of theater ( no intermission) directed sharpley by Hamid Dehghani, we see why playwright Sylvia Khoury’s play was a finalist for the 2022 Pulitzer Prize. We see him hiding and avoiding the neighbor down the hall, Leyla ( Shadee Vossoughi) as she struggles to see if he has been around. She also has a new baby and a husband and is also fearful of what the Taliban will do if they cannot find Taroon."
Chicago Theatre Review - Highly Recommended
"...Northlight’s newest production is a must-see suspenseful journey for both the characters and the audience. The story plays out in real time, taking place in scenic designer Joseph Johnson’s detailed, claustrophobic apartment setting. The authentic costumes designed by David Arevalo and Mariah Bennett’s specific props, including an important working TV and a laptop computer and router, make this story feel particularly realistic. Hamid has gently guided his gifted and likable cast in telling this gripping story. While entertaining us, Sylvia Khoury’s tension-filled drama puts names and faces to the horrific reality that’s still taking place in a faraway land."
Third Coast Review - Highly Recommended
"...Lights come up on a live broadcast. On the television on the far corner of the small apartment, we witness President Barack Obama announcing that American troops would withdraw from Afghanistan. Immediately the audience is transported to a different place and time-to Afghanistan in 2013. As the characters begin to weave in and out of the story, it becomes clear that America's choice has a very different impact on everyone involved. Selling Kabul, Sylvia Khoury's drama at Northlight Theatre, may only be 90 minutes, but the broadcast acts as the inciting moment for an emotionally jam-packed piece that runs full speed ahead until the lights come down at the end of the show."
Chicago On Stage - Highly Recommended
"..."Promote change of perspective and encourage compassion by exploring the depth of our humanity across a bold spectrum... reflecting our community to the world and the world to our community." Northlight Theatre's mission is on full display in their current production of Selling Kabul, directed by Hamid Dehghani. Sylvia Khoury's suspenseful drama, a 2022 Pulitzer Prize finalist, is no gentle tug on our emotional thread. With a full-fisted grip on our collective conscience, the anguish that exists daily for many Afghans is brought to life through the story of one man in hiding, on one fateful night."
Chicago Culture Authority - Recommended
"...Regardless of who lives and who dies, Iranian director Hamid Dehghani (last seen at Northlight onstage in Andy Warhol in Iran) creates a claustrophobic sense of walls closing in that indicates no one will escape this violent and suffocating crackdown unscathed. Peck, Kamal and Vossoughi play out their deadly game of chess in such a way that we see there are no heroes and villains here, only victims doing anything they can to protect themselves and the ones they love."
City Pleasures - Highly Recommended
"...When the United States hastily and clumsily pulled out of Afghanistan in August of 2021, chaotic became the single word that reverberated through the news cycle regarding its exodus. Although both promised and anticipated, the departure proved an abrupt and awkward end to a record twenty-year investment in U.S. blood and U.S. dollars. Scenes of desperation and rank terror as people swarmed Kabul’s airport in their attempts to escape the country filled television screens. Afghanis who worked with U.S. troops as interpreters and helpers knew they would be targeted by the Taliban as collaborators and punished, likely by death. Selling Kabul, a superb play written by Sylvia Khoury now at Northlight, is about a man and his family who weren’t able to secure seats on one of those planes."
Evanston Roundtable - Highly Recommended
"...Selling Kabul, now at Northlight Theatre, was a 2022 Pulitzer Prize finalist. The political background of the play is both familiar and uncomfortable for Americans: President Barack Obama announces the planned withdrawal of most U.S. troops from Afghanistan. Then the Taliban take control of much of the country and the Afghans who helped and translated for U.S. soldiers become Taliban targets, and expect to be rescued with visas to the U.S."
Splash Magazine - Highly Recommended
"...Every aspect of this production is exquisite. The script keeps you on the edge of your seat until all ninety minutes come to an end. As the audience member, you never quite know what will happen the to the four characters in a single apartment room."
BroadwayWorld - Highly Recommended
"...Altogether, Northlight has mounted a moving production of SELLING KABUL worthy of the play's many accolades. For now, at least, it is the closest many can come to understanding the life-or-death conflict many Afghans face, a conflict that has no sign of ending anytime soon. It's no wonder that Northlight has helpfully included in the play's program ways in which audiences can encourage politicians to help American allies who have been unjustly left to fend for themselves."
NewCity Chicago - Highly Recommended
"...The story itself is compelling, with the characters inhabiting a complicated and ever-changing world where sometimes a wanted man finds it necessary to dress himself in fatigues under a chador. It matters greatly here whom you trust, and Taroon was a fool to trust America. In post-war Afghanistan it is the heroes who suffer the greatest."
