{"id":1248,"date":"2016-03-23T20:34:52","date_gmt":"2016-03-23T20:34:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.taand.com\/en\/?p=1248"},"modified":"2016-03-29T20:39:19","modified_gmt":"2016-03-29T20:39:19","slug":"afghans-feminist-tv-drama-smashes-taboos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/?p=1248","title":{"rendered":"Afghan\u2019s feminist TV drama smashes taboos"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

 <\/p>\n

In a grimy Kabul street, the director gives the order to roll the cameras, and filming starts on a remarkable new TV drama that boldly challenges taboos about women in conservative Afghanistan.<\/p>\n

Shereen, the star, enters the scene and buys a few things from street vendors when suddenly her husband, a possessive and brutal man, grabs her.<\/p>\n

But tough, no-nonsense Shereen won\u2019t back down and a row ensues. Shereen\u2019s Law, due to be aired on Afghan TV before the end of the year, tells the story of a 36-year-old woman who brings up three children on her own while forging a career as a clerk at a court in Kabul.<\/p>\n

Such a character is already shocking in an overwhelmingly patriarchal society where most women are confined to lives of menial domesticity.<\/p>\n

But the show deliberately ramps up the impact. Shereen fights corruption, harassment, and rape, and tries to divorce her husband, whom she wed in a forced marriage.<\/p>\n

More than 13 years after the fall of the Taliban, Afghanistan remains deeply wedded to traditional customs and its airwaves have never hosted anything like this before.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is the first such drama \u2014 that is about women, that is about empowering women, that is about the struggles of women in Afghanistan,\u201d Leena Alam, the Afghan actress who plays Shereen, said.<\/p>\n

Giving women a voice<\/p>\n

Women in Afghanistan still suffer brutal violence on a daily basis. On March 19 a young woman was beaten to death and her body burned in central Kabul for allegedly burning a Quran. Defying entrenched conventions in such a country comes with a risk, as Alam \u2014 who moved to the US as a child with her family before returning in 2007 \u2014 admits.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a bit dangerous, even for myself. Yesterday we were shooting outside. When… I\u2019m waiting for the shot I\u2019m always scared that somebody may throw acid on me or somebody may hit me with a knife,\u201d she said. Casting the show was not easy \u2014 several actors said no to a storyline they found just too challenging. One, who played a lawyer friend of Shereen, was forced to pull out because her husband was unhappy with the show. As well as portraying a strong female character, the series attacks the Afghan judicial system, where rampant corruption is hidden behind a wall of silence.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt takes a lot of courage to write something like this and it takes a lot of courage to play something like Shereen,\u201d Alam, a producer who has also appeared in several Afghan films, said. \u201cBut I think it\u2019s time, after more than 30 years, to move on and educate people and give them the information as bluntly as Shereen.\u201d<\/p>\n

Apart from the exterior street scenes, the show\u2019s action takes place in a studio with sets decked out to look like a courtroom, Shereen\u2019s house and legal offices. No detail has been missed, from the portrait of President Ashraf Ghani in the courtroom to the stapler on Shereen\u2019s desk.<\/p>\n

Breaking barriers<\/strong><\/p>\n

Director and writer Max Walker, an Australian who came to work in Afghanistan, says he took advice in advance on how to avoid drawing too much attention from conservative clerics.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s been an enormous consultation, an enormous review of the script and of the whole storytelling process to make sure that it raises these issues, but it doesn\u2019t raise them so bluntly and so offensively that it\u2019s going to make the programme go off air,\u201d Walker said. Under the Taliban\u2019s hardline 1996-2001 regime, television was banned, but now 58 percent of homes have a set, according to the Asia Foundation development organisation.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  In a grimy Kabul street, the director gives the order to roll the cameras, and filming starts<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1249,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[108],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture"],"yoast_head":"\nAfghan\u2019s feminist TV drama smashes taboos - Taand English<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/?p=1248\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Afghan\u2019s feminist TV drama smashes taboos - Taand English\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"  In a grimy Kabul street, the director gives the order to roll the cameras, and filming starts\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/?p=1248\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Taand English\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-03-23T20:34:52+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-03-29T20:39:19+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/210.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"323\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"277\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"taandcom\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"taandcom\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/?p=1248#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/?p=1248\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"taandcom\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/3681fac18d733fc714b6134f14e0d46a\"},\"headline\":\"Afghan\u2019s feminist TV drama smashes taboos\",\"datePublished\":\"2016-03-23T20:34:52+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2016-03-29T20:39:19+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/?p=1248\"},\"wordCount\":615,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/?p=1248#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/210.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Culture\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/?p=1248#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/?p=1248\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/taand.net\/en\/?p=1248\",\"name\":\"Afghan\u2019s feminist TV drama smashes taboos - 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