Pittsburgh Filmmakers take on Iraq from home

In Service: Authentic Narrative From Iraq to Pittsburgh Runs October 11-14 Harris… In Service: Authentic Narrative From Iraq to Pittsburgh Runs October 11-14 Harris Theater 809 Liberty Ave 8 p.m. 412-456-6666

In the midst of one of the most hyped, double-sided wars in decades, the United States has become a battleground itself – a platform for biased arguments and debates. Living in Pittsburgh, 200 miles from our nation’s capital and oceans away from the conflicted countries, it is difficult to not make the war exclusively political.

Jeffrey Carpenter, mastermind of Pittsburgh’s Bricolage Theater Company, and Andrew Swensen, director at Pittsburgh Filmmakers, made it an initiative to bring the reality of the Iraq war to Pittsburgh, without the tainted politics, in the form of a multimedia event called In Service: Authentic Narrative From Iraq to Pittsburgh.

The main focus of In Service is the untold story of Pittsburgh natives and current residents who have recently served in Iraq.

Swenson explained, “The concept of Bricolage was based on community theater. Residents of the town would get up to tell their story.”

The event combines live narration, photography and videos from the warfront, streaming interviews and live theater performance to create an intense two hours of evidence that the war is more real than one could ever imagine.

“We thought that it would be a powerful thing to conceive a project that combines media and live stage,” Swensen said.

Pittsburgh Filmmakers is a company known for its education in film arts and its exhibition of media artists through venues all over Pittsburgh. Bricolage Theater Company is an organization, which emphasizes the use of our city’s resources to create theatrical productions that involve the audience.

Swensen described this collaboration: “We each had our own kernel of our project and realized we would have an even better project if we combined them.”

When it comes down to it, this production would be nothing without the men and women who provided their sorrowful, yet oftentimes triumphant, tales of being overseas. All of the interviewees and participants are soldiers and diplomats who are either from Pittsburgh or reside here currently. Ann Turiano, assistant director at Pittsburgh Filmmakers and line producer of In Service, said that the soldiers were mostly found through simple word of mouth.

“Once they started talking, we were inundated with interview material,” Turiano explained. “These guys deserve to be asked because they never are.”

The Harris Theater sets the stage for this heart-wrenching display of autobiographical accounts. The theater is purposefully arranged to give everyone in the audience a piece of the construction. Along with the main center screen, there is an additional screen projected out of the right-top corner and another coming out of the bottom left. Across the bottom lies the stage, where the actors and participants sit and take turns in approaching the audience. While the main screen streams interviews, the other screens project still photography and self-filmed videos that weave together with the harmony of a practiced orchestra.

Most of the men and women shown are young; a few of them are even studying at the University of Pittsburgh. No matter their age, none of them will forget the life-changing experiences that have stemmed from the ongoing Iraq war.

Corporal James Stuck, one of the interviewees, exhibits the look of a recognizable young man, complete with tousled hair and a mischievous smile, but the bottom half of his body exemplifies the aged marks of battle: He lost his leg in the Iraq war. Despite this, he remains upbeat throughout the interview and describes his sacrifice with nothing but pride.

J. Scott Carpenter, deputy assistant secretary of state and a Pittsburgh native, was one of two Americans who had the “honor” of meeting with Saddam Hussein on the very day he was captured. Carpenter gives a thorough description of Hussein’s nervous composure in the small cell. Pictures of this personal event flashed diagonally across the screens as he spoke. Carpenter describes Hussein’s response to other men’s questions about his inhumane killing of his own people. Carpenter said Hussein’s words were simple: “They were traitors, they deserved to die.”

To gather all of the footage and in-depth narratives involved a great undertaking.

“This project is something we have wanted to do for a long time; we have been working on it for over a year,” Turano said.

With such a wide array of participants and experiences, the project becomes a sort of mosaic, something to be pieced together differently according to each individual of the audience.

In association with In Service, Filmmakers Galleries will be hosting the works of war-related photojournalists Chris Hondros and Nina Berman. Hondros, who resides in Iraq alongside the soldiers, uses photography to show the reality of the war. His display is called “Grave and Deteriorating: Images of the Iraq War.”Berman’s Purple Hearts is a series of her interviews and photos, which give a visual perspective of the particular intensity felt at a soldier’s homecoming.