General

‘12 Angry Men’ in the most unlikely of places

Prisoners in Lebanon’s largest jail stages play

The Wall Street Journal has the story of an unlikely performance of “12 Angry Men”—staged by prisoners at Roumieh, Lebanon’s biggest penitentiary. The Reginald Rose play—about a group of people, each of whom comes to realize what it means to take another person’s life—was originally a U.S. T.V. drama, then a famous 1957 movie. But inmates at Roumieh may understand the plot on a level that most of us probably don’t—many of the performers are themselves living out the consequences of taking another person’s life. The notion that “we’re all complicit in the tragedy because we’re all part of the system,” actually makes some sense in the troubled region, where summary justice by bomb and bullet often comes first, militias and warlords generate crime, and society keeps mum out of fear, writes Melik Kaylan.

Wall Street Journal

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