Farber takes new play to Edinburgh

It's almost a year since Mies Julie, Yael Farber's adaptation of August Strindberg's 1888 play Miss Julie, won the Best of Edinburgh award.

Not resting on her laurels after the critical acclaim of this fierce and sexually charged post-apartheid interpretation of a relationship across class and race, the South African-born Farber is taking her new play, Nirbhaya, to this year's Edinburgh Festival for its world premier.

The play, informed by the gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old physiotherapy student Jyoti Singh Pandey, in India, is expected to become one of the highest-profile productions at the festival.

Nirbhaya (Hindi for "the fearless one") is based not only on Pandey's horrific rape but on the real-life testimonies of the Indian actors who are victims of sexual violence.

Poorna Jagannathan, one of the performers and a co-producer, told The Times, UK: "If you are a woman living in India you have experienced either sexual violence or sexual violation."

Three of the performers - Rukhsar Kabir, Priyanka Bose and Jagannathan - are actresses from India. Sneha Jawale and Sapna Bhavnani have never performed on stage.

Their personal accounts tell of molestation by uncles and caregivers in their younger days, being beaten by their father, or marital abuse.

One actress describes being gang-raped and another relates being burned by her husband and his brother.

In preparation for the Edinburgh festival the play had a week-long run, which ended on Saturday night, at the Riverside Studios, in London.

The play will open in Edinburgh on Thursday next week.