Mikaela Lily Davies in The Caged Bird Sings, which runs until June 28 at Toronto's Tarragon Theatre.Jae Yang/Supplied
- Title: The Caged Bird Sings
- Written by: Rouvan Silogix, Rafeh Mahmud and Ahad Lakhani
- Performed by: Mikaela Lily Davies, Navtej Sandhu, Rouvan Silogix
- Director: Rafeh Mahmud
- Company: Modern Times and Theatre ARTaud, presented by Tarragon Theatre
- Venue: Tarragon Theatre Extraspace
- City: Toronto, Ont.
- Year: Runs until June 28
When The Caged Bird Sings premiered at the Aga Khan Museum in 2024, critics and audiences were close to rapturous. A theatrical adaptation of Masnavi, originally written by Sufi mystic and poet Rumi, the piece played outdoors in a giant cage with bars on all sides – a fitting set for a play about prisons, both metaphorical and real. I didn’t see that production, but remember vividly the buzz it generated in Toronto’s theatre scene.
Two years later, The Caged Bird Sings – its title is sort of, but not entirely, a Maya Angelou reference – is back in Toronto, presented by Tarragon Theatre in its intimate Extraspace and curiously billed by co-producer Modern Times as a “world premiere.” (It’s not the first piece of programming in Tarragon’s season to use that term loosely – Bremen Town, while expanded beautifully in the Tarragon Mainspace last fall, premiered at the Next Stage Festival in 2023.)
The most obvious avenue in which The Caged Bird Sings has changed since 2024 is its set: Waleed Ansari’s design suggests a cage on the Extraspace stage, but stops short of fully enclosing its actors in a freestanding structure. Prison bars are suggested by Arun Srinivasan’s lighting and a roof suspended in midair; the impossibility of escape, meanwhile, is made clear by a great many shouty declarations that the cage is impermeable.
The play’s premise, however, is much the same as it was two years ago. We’re in a jail cell that seems to defy the laws of physics, where time passes in unpredictable gushes and spurts. Three prisoners call the cell home: Star-crossed scientists Rumi and Jin (Mikaela Lily Davies and Navtej Sandhu) and a mysterious, slightly batty vagrant named Sal (Rouvan Silogix).
Rouvan Silogix plays Sal in The Caged Bird Sings.Jae Yang/Supplied
The script, co-created by Silogix, Ahad Lakhani and Rafeh Mahmud (who also directs), is divided into three parts, each of which then splits further into a handful of individually titled scenes. The early vignettes are story-based and help to establish how Rumi and Jin ended up in prison – and how their romantic relationship exploded in a fury of broken trust, after Rumi surreptitiously slipped Jin tiny doses of a powerful love potion.
The play gets progressively more abstract, and even absurd, as it barrels toward its conclusion. Titles of scenes help to establish tone: punny names such as “Rum-eo and Jiniet” and “Gin Rumi” add levity to a piece that frolics in the world of the absurd. (Lest there be any confusion about the work’s absurdist bent, one scene is titled in honour of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot; another inexplicably sees the cast muse about “pussycats” on loop.)
Indeed, there’s plenty to enjoy in the script, from the frictions of Jin and Rumi’s romance to the quirky humour that the three co-writers sneak into the text. Modern colloquialisms, too, add fascinating texture to how the three inmates interact.
But at Tarragon, Mahmud’s production never quite gels. All three actors offer performances too large for the space, at varying levels of yelly and overly broad. Silogix, in particular, is a disappointment as Sal – while Sandhu and Davies find some nuance in their respective roles, Silogix picks a level and stays there, making his interjections to the central story feel increasingly grating over time.
As well, Ansari’s set seems to take a step back from its predecessor. By removing the physical limitations of a fully realized jail cell, the play’s stakes somewhat deflate. As such, The Caged Bird Sings is, in effect, uncaged – it’s an odd change, and one that doesn’t pay off in the Extraspace.
There’s the additional question of the Rumi of it all. The philosopher looms large over The Caged Bird Sings – much of the play is told in lyrical, highly surreal language that honours his legacy – but the connection between Rumi the poet and Rumi the character is imprecise and vague. Within the complex, interweaving logics of the play, are Rumi and Rumi one and the same? Or, are they perhaps echoes of each other, separated by time and mediated through the mysterious cell?
Navtej Sandhu in The Caged Bird Sings.Jae Yang/Supplied
There’s room yet to tighten the work, too – right now, it’s a 70-minute play in a 90-minute coat, with cuts left to be made from the play’s top and tail.
I’ve no doubt The Caged Bird Sings was stunning in 2024. I’ve seen the photos and, even from behind a screen, can attest to the power of that clever set. The language of the play, too, is beautiful, if occasionally a touch frustrating. But it seems something’s gone awry on the play’s move from the Aga Khan Museum to Tarragon – perhaps some birds ought to remain caged.