The Definitive Guide to Living in the Capital , Cairo , Egypt

We realise that we’ve overwhelmed you with all the festival-related articles, but we can’t keep up with the activities that keep popping up in this entertainment-filled season. Therefore, we can’t promise you that this will be our last article on the subject.

This piece is dedicated to the upcoming Cairo International Festival for Contemporary and Experimental Theatre (CIFCET)that starts today and concludes on the 20^th of September. It is headed by SamehMahran, president of the festival and former president of the Academy of Arts. For its 26^th year, the Ministry of Culture has organised the non-competitive festival to “create a forum for communication and dialogue among diverse populations and communities by means of the various forms of theatre and performance.”

After the Fantasticks, the originally-American off-Broadway production kicks off the festival today at the opening ceremony at the Cairo Opera House, many performances and events are scheduled to follow over the upcoming days, including several workshops and MasterClasses. Egypt Today states that about 179 performances from 68 countries will be presented, including India, Greece, and Brazil.

Not to mention the main event; a two-day intellectual seminar on theatre-related topics concerning Africa, which will be accompanied by five presentations, selected from18 presentations from 13 non-Arab African countries. Our source adds that the number of Arab participants has reached 87 shows, representing 16 Arab countries, with 15 theatrical performances from Tunisia alone.

We have to recognise and appreciate the country’s keen interest in celebrating all the different branches of the performing arts, especially the theatre, an immortal art form that will forever be cemented into our history. You can check out the festival’s preliminary schedule right here.