Remote Theater Project has a limited engagement at A.R.T./New York’s Gural Theatre this January for the world premiere of The Unraveling, a new play by Nushin Arbabzadah set in southern Afghanistan during the last two weeks before US troops pulled out. Afghan filmmaker Roya Sadat directs. Performances begin Thursday, January 7, 2027, and opening night is Monday, January 11.
The company commissioned the play. Its central figure is Roya, a young Afghan woman who has been quietly planning to leave for America with her secret lover, an interpreter working for the US Army. As the withdrawal closes in, that plan falls apart, and the rest of her life goes with it. Friendship, love and betrayal all run through the story, which Arbabzadah built from firsthand accounts by young women whose lives were overturned in August 2021.
Sadat was in Seattle directing an opera when Kabul fell to the Taliban; she and her family have since been granted asylum in the US. Her films have collected more than 50 international awards, and A Letter to the President was Afghanistan’s official entry for Best Foreign-Language Film at the 2018 Oscars. Arbabzadah left Afghanistan at 12 and works as a journalist and scholar as well as a playwright. Her first full-length play, Afghan Girls Don’t Cry, was staged in London in 2018 as part of a Kali Theatre festival.
“Putting these two artists together, from different sides of the Afghan diaspora, has been a deeply rewarding experience,” said Alexandra Aron, the company’s artistic director. “Both strong women; they push each other, question each other’s suppositions, which enriches the work and deepens the characters.”
Leda Rasooli (English at Capital Stage) plays Roya. Haythem Noor plays Ebrahim and Shahzeb Hussain plays Abdul; both were in the national tour of The Kite Runner. Noor Hamdi, an understudy on The Skin of Our Teeth, is Karim, and Hamid Whab is Yama. The actor playing Jack has not been announced yet.
Aron produces, in association with XYZ Theatricals. Sets are by Izmir Ichbal, costumes by Dina el Aziz, lighting by Tyler Micolau and sound by Sinan Zifran. Hera Jung is the production stage manager.
The Unraveling runs 85 minutes, at the Gural Theatre inside A.R.T./New York Theatres, 502 West 53rd Street, through Sunday, January 24, 2027. The regular schedule is Thursdays and Fridays at 7 p.m., Saturdays at 3 p.m. and 7 p.m., and Sundays at 3 p.m., with the opening on Monday, January 11, also at 7 p.m. Tickets are $25–65, sold online and at the theater from an hour before each performance.
Ahead of the run, the company holds a one-night benefit on November 5 at 7 p.m. at The Private Curtain at KGB Bar: a screening of Sadat’s film Sima’s Song, then a Q&A and a reception.
For more information, visit the Remote Theater Project website.
