Akhtar's "Disgraced' at Lincoln Center in NY

Rarely in the theater will you hear a cry of pain as piercing as Amir's "“ a man whose self-destruction rivals that of Oedipus's.

Amir, a New York mergers-and-acquisitions lawyer in Ayad Akhtar's explosive new play Disgraced, confronts a problem worthy of Oedipus: He doesn't know who he is. Moreover, he's afraid to find out. As a Pakistani native who's determined to succeed in corporate America, Amir does everything he can to obfuscate his ethnic identity, fearing it will prevent him from assimilating.

So Amir renounces his roots. He tells his WASP trophy-wife, the beautiful blond Emily, that he hates Islam and that the views of his traditional Muslim mother were bigoted and outdated. He tells his (Jewish) senior law partners that he was born in India, lest they think he's a terrorist. He renounces the Koran to his friend Isaac, calling it "one long hate mail to humanity" and blaming it for the rise of the Taliban.

"Islam means submission," he lectures his nephew Hussein. "We're the new Jews," he warns Jory, his African-American law associate, who, like Amir, hopes to assimilate.

American dream

Amir dreams that one day his law firm will be called "Leibowitz, Bernstein, Harris and Kapoor" "“ a name that epitomizes assimilation in multi-cultural America. And he's determined to achieve that dream.

But Amir encounters obstacles. Everyone around him"“ Emily, Isaac, Jory and Hussein"“ is pro-Islam. Moreover, they pressure Amir to give legal representation to a local Imam who, they feel, has been unjustly arrested and persecuted. Amir capitulates and complies with their wishes, precipitating his downfall.

The plot thickens when Amir and Emily host a dinner party, with Isaac and Jory as their guests. Isaac, an art collector, has decided to exhibit Emily's Islamic-inspired paintings in his gallery. However, their celebration soon disintegrates into a bloodbath of revelations.

Reduced to a stereotype

Amir, it turns out, has been betrayed by everyone"“ by his wife (who is having an affair with Isaac), by his associate Jory (who is being promoted to partner instead of Amir), and by his law firm (which is alarmed by Amir's support of the Imam and plans to let him go). In a frenzy of despair, Amir is reduced to the stereotype imposed upon him, and lashes out violently against the hostile world that surrounds him.

Is Amir a victim of a paranoid America, or of his own cowardice in failing to define his true identity? These are the pressing questions that this provocative play asks.

In the scenes between Amir and his nephew Hussein, the depth of American Muslims' identity crisis is revealed. Hussein, representing the younger generation of Muslim immigrants, looks upon his uncle as a role model. How can a Muslim survive and succeed in America, and at the same time preserve traditions? What is Muslim/American identity, and how can it deal with ethnic stereotyping?

Familiar devices

Finding no answers to his questions from his Uncle Amir, Hussein is lost. Although he has changed his name to "Abe Jensen" in order to fit in, Hussein is ultimately victimized by racial profiling, arrested over a harmless incident and recruited by the CIA to seek out terrorists within the Muslim/American community.

"They have disgraced us," Hussein cries out to his uncle. Embittered and beleaguered, the mild-mannered Hussein (like his uncle) is reduced to the stereotype imposed upon him, and becomes a reactionary radical.

At times, Disgraced seems schematic and contrived, with its familiar setting (the Upper East Side dinner party), melodramatic plot and derivative structure. Playwright Akhtar relies on the familiar two-couple formula, immortalized by Noel Coward in Private Lives and repeatedly utilized by Edward Albee (in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, A Delicate Balance and The Play About The Baby, for example).

Bleeding hearts and urban Jews

At times, too, I thought I was watching Yazmina Reza's God of Carnage, another contemporary two-couple play that disintegrates into urban, affluent domestic violence. (For my review of God of Carnage, click here.)

Then there are the all-too-familiar archetypal characters: the bleeding-heart liberal WASP Emily, the urban Jewish intellectual Isaac, and the upwardly mobile African-American female lawyer Jory.

Nevertheless, Akhtar's script exploits these elements effectively. Aided by a skilled director and ensemble (led by an affecting Aasif Mandvi as Amir), Disgraced packs a dramatic wallop throughout its wild 90-minute ride.

Ultimately, the value of this provocative play lies in the critical question of identity ("Who am I?") that terrorizes its leading character. It's a question that more of us are confronting in this ever-changing, complex world.

With it comes a warning that, if the question goes unanswered, consequences will follow.