Iranian work Blind Runner is defiant artmaking across borders
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Iranian theatremaker Amir Reza Koohestani's Mehr Theatre Group is presenting Blind Runner at Esplanade's The Studios 2026 season.
PHOTO: BENJAMIN KRIEG
- Blind Runner, by Iranian director Amir Reza Koohestani, explores themes of political oppression and separation through a minimalist play about a blind marathoner and her guide fleeing danger.
- The play is created across borders with actors in exile and in Tehran.
- Blind Runner has received international acclaim and tours globally, with plans for future performances in California.
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SINGAPORE – The United States’ ongoing “unjust war” on Iran looms dreadfully over Iranian director and playwright Amir Reza Koohestani’s Blind Runner, which plays in Singapore from July 31 to Aug 2. But he cautions the play does not need the noise of war to stay relevant: “In fact, war can obscure its clarity.”
The show has roots in the aftermath of the crackdown on Iran’s Green Movement in 2009, when Koohestani started running to escape the memories of tear gas. That small freedom was soon aborted when an orthopaedist ordered him to stop running indefinitely after a bad cramp. Running is fraught with political implications in Blind Runner, which sees a political prisoner’s husband guide a blind marathoner in a perilous dash across the Channel Tunnel to avoid being hit by a train.
