Embedded: A New Satire Explores The Art of War

Phi Kappa Phi Forum, Summer 2004 by Motzkus, Heidi Tolles

Embedded: A New Satire Explores The Art of War

In November of 2003, Los Angeles had the exceptional good fortune of being the birthplace of a riveting, raucous, satirical new play entitled, Embedded. Written and directed by Tim Robbins, and presented by The Actors' Gang, the L.A.-based theater of which Robbins is a co-founder, Embedded played to sold-out houses in Los Angeles through February 2004. The production then moved to The Public Theater in New York City, where the run was extended three times and the play performed twice a night on some nights of the week.

Embedded conceives of a world in which the United States is at war with an oil-laden, fictional Middle Eastern country called Gomorrah. The action of the play moves nimbly among three sets of characters: the cabal of neoconservative government officials who have created the war, the embedded journalists allowed to live with the military, and the sympathetically portrayed soldiers being sent to war.

A bitingly satirical and entertaining play, Embedded is also instructive. The playwright brings into focus the ideas of the neoconservative philosopher Leo Strauss (1899-1973) in a hilarious, yet chilling, manner. In brief, Leo Strauss believed that an elite few in society should know the truth. These elite few may have to tell lies to the uncomprehending masses. He believed also that, "because mankind is intrinsically wicked, he has to be governed." This governance can be established only "when men are united - and they can only be united against other people." Following Machiavelli, Strauss felt that if no external threat to a nation existed, then one had to be manufactured. This notion underlies the most bitingly satirical scenes, as the grotesquely masked cabinet members build a war from the safety of their offices. This cabal of neocons, with such names as Pearly White, Gondola, Rum-Rum and Woofy, chant incantations and light candles to Strauss at the end of each cabinet meeting. The satire becomes especially pointed with the knowledge that members of the current administration's cabinet have been students of Strauss himself, or students of his students.

The vignettes depicting the journalists who are to be "embedded," defined as a media representative remaining with a military unit on an extended basis, are educational. With a sharp, humorous edge, the play shows the procedures through which journalists are allowed to see, or not see, certain events and the process through which their copy must pass before it is approved. Quickly, during a hilarious journalists' bootcamp scene, these journalists learn what they cannot, should not, and must not say. The scenes carry a certain validity after CNN's Christiane Amanpour admitted that CNN "was intimidated" by the current administration into "a climate of fear and self-censorship."

Least satirical, and most touching, are the scenes depicting the young soldiers being sent off to war. The sorrowful parents at the airport tell their daughter Jen-Jen how sorry they are that they were not rich enough to send her to college. Later, the cute, blond Jen-Jen is injured and sent to a hospital in Gomorrah, where her life is saved by a Middle Eastern doctor. However, the cabinet, and then the press, need a hero so, for the sake of nationalism, they turn Jen-Jen into one, much against her protestations against the twisting of the facts. In a wrenching scene, her mother and father tell Jen-Jen that her memory of the facts is wrong, and they tell her the official story, told to them by officials. The family has been offered a large sum of money for the rights to a television version of this official story. They need the money, and the Straussian elite has decided that America needs a hero.

The atmosphere at The Actors' Gang during the Los Angeles incarnation of Embedded was celebratory. When the play first opened, it was unusual to hear any critique of the United States' involvement in Iraq from the corporate media. Further, it was unusual to hear any criticism of the corporate media's lack of rigor on this subject. For those accustomed to reading the foreign press or following the liberal media, the ideas that the American public had been deceived into believing that we should go to war and that the administration had control, of some sort, over the corporate media were not new. What was new to these audience members was the opportunity to hear these ideas expressed in a public, communal forum. The energy exchanged between the grateful audience members and the talented, dedicated cast created an electric atmosphere. For audience members to whom these ideas were new, the satirical nature of Embedded removed the events of the play from reality just enough to allow audience members to think about the play's ideas in isolation from the emotional fervor that surrounds any mention of U.S. involvement in Iraq.

At its best, the theater presents its audience with ideas to be pondered. These ideas ideally lead to a dialogue through which audience members are enriched, enlightened, or educated, or presented with an alternate viewpoint of world events to consider. As spectators left The Actors' Gang after delivering a lengthy standing ovation, their conversations were firmly embedded in the ideas of the play. "Is that really true?," or "I am so glad someone is finally telling the truth!" or "Have you ever heard of Leo Strauss before tonight?" or "I heard a discussion of that on Democracy Now!" are just a few of the comments made by patrons lingering in the lobby after the show. The Actors' Gang had plastered the lobby walls from floor to ceiling with newspaper articles from around the world and across the political spectrum. People huddled close to the walls, reading glasses were brought out, and perfect strangers talked to one another about what they read there.