Trident Moon - Review of 2025 Crow’s Theatre Production

Trident Moon by Anusree Roy holds the promise of a tense, dramatic play set in 1947 during the carving up of a part of the British Empire, the Indian subcontinent, into India and Pakistan. Six women, three Muslim and three Hindu are in a truck traveling from Pakistan to India. The Hindu women were servants of the Muslim women and have abducted their former masters and all are in a truck heading for India. The servants are seeking revenge for the death of the husband of one of the women. This may be termed as the revenge of the servants.
The Hindu Alo (Anusree Roy) seeks revenge on the Muslim women for the murder of her husband and sons by the Muslim Pari’s (Muhaddisah) husband. She is with her sister Pari (Muhaddisah) and daughter Arun (Sahiba Arora). The well-off Muslims are abducted, as I said, by their former Hindu servants. Sweet vengeance.
The Hindu women are travelling to the safety of India. The husband of Alo (Anusree Roy), one of the Hindu women, was killed and she is bent on wreaking vengeances on the Muslim women in the truck. The fate of the captives may be as ugly as delivering them to sexual abuse in the hands of Hindus. This is even though Alo raised the child Heera (Prerna Nehta) who is in the truck.
The women are travelling through the hellish war that is raging along the route. There is anger, violent language and physical violence. A woman is seriously injured and stretched on the floor. The women face imminent danger and they fear what might happen any minute. They are joined by two other women that are equally terrified of what maught happen to them. In a war zone no one is safe and the abductors and their captives soon realize that no one is safe.
It is all a very dramatic story with some marvelous performances but some dramatic problems. The cast are dressed in traditional costumes of different colours for the Hindus and the Muslims. The problem is figuring out the details of who is who and what is happening in the plot development. I am not sure of the names of all the characters and I could not always hear what they were saying. At times, there is a lack of enunciation sufficiency to follow all the dialogue. That means parts of the plot simply did not register.
We hear the noise of the truck and plenty of boom booms without much context or explanation. You can’t have a war thriller and a situation where the captors and their captives seem to put their differences aside when the external dangers take over and someone demands sex. A woman raises her dress and bends over allowing him to rape her. Some context, please.
One of the women has a gun that she keeps brandishing and near the end a half-naked man brandishing a rifle boards the truck. He is a thug demanding gold and is told there is none and he goes on to conduct a ludicrous body search of all the women. He is a bit of a clown or just an idiot who overacts and is simply annoying. He is named Lovely (Mirza Saehan), the only male in he cast and easy to identify.
The set by Jawon Kang features the rear door of a truck and large curtains from the top of the stage envelope scene. We see smoke and hear explosions and rifle shots when the truck door is open. It is simply hellish.
We are grateful to Anusree Roy for writing a play about a pivotal and tragic point at the end of British rule of India and its incompetent and disastrous division into India and Pakistan. Unfortunately, the production, despite the powerful story of the play, lacks clarity and context. Director Nina Lee Aquino commits some fundamental errors in not ensuring that all the actors spoke clearly, enunciated and could be heard at all times.
The names of the cast are Arun (Sahiba Arora), Sumaia (Afroza Banu), Bani (Sehar Bhojani), Munni (Michelle Mohammed), Pari (Muhaddisah), Heera (Prerna Nehta), Rabia (Imali Perera), Sonali (Zorana Sadiq), Lovely (Mirza Sarhan).
A big disappointment.
Trident Moon by Anusree Roy opened on March 7, 2025, continues until March 30, 2025, at the Guloien Theatre, Crow’s Theatre, 345 Carlaw Avenue, Toronto, Ontario. http://crowstheatre.com/

The cast of Trident Moon. Photo: Dahlia Katz.

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