Morteza Nouri
Jalal Tehrani, an Iranian dramatist, theater director, critic, screenwriter, lighting, and set designer, was born on 3 August 1968 in Tehran, Iran. He graduated in dramatic literature from Tehran University. His career in theatre directing began in 2002 with the staging of his own play, “Nefertiti,” following the publication of his first play, “The Boatman,” in Donyaye Tasvir magazine in 1998.
In 2004, Tehrani premiered three of his plays, “The Tank,” “Single Cells,” and “Hey, Big Man! Don’t Cry,” at the City Theatre of Tehran and Molavi Theatre. Play readings of his dramas have been performed at Iranian Artists Forum and City Theatre of Tehran. He also staged “The Single Cells” at The Silk Road Festival in Mülheim, Germany, in 2003.
Between 2006 and 2009, he delved into screenwriting and theatre studies, resulting in several screenplays, including “Mercy”, which participated in the Toronto Festival in 2008 under the direction of Madak Taebi. Other screenplays include “The Shawl”, “It’s Raining in the Hell”, “The Finished Story”, and “The Trash Talk.”
In 2009, he founded the Maktabe Tehran Institute to support his educational endeavors in theatre, offering professional training, publishing, workshops, a bookstore, and more. Since its inception, Maktabe Tehran has organized 11 festivals for its art students in playwriting, directing, and acting.
Throughout the years, Tehrani staged various plays, such as “Listen to the Sound of the Earth” (2012), “Cinderella” (2013), “Two Clown and a Half” (2014), and “The Season for Hunting Kites” (2015) at The City Theatre of Tehran. He also adapted Bergman’s “Autumn Sonata” (2017) at Iranshahr Theatre.
In 2018, he simultaneously staged two plays, “Silver” and “Around the World in Eighty Days,” at Maktabe Tehran Theatre with his students as actors, with the latter running for about a year without press advertisement. His most recent production was an adaptation of Marguerite Duras’ “La Musica,” performed at Maktabe Tehran hall in 2019, featuring his current generation of students.
Currently, since December 2021, Tehrani is rehearsing “The Tank” for the third time with art students from Maktabe Tehran. Additionally, during his studies at Tehran University from 1998 to 1999, he wrote theatre critiques, including one about Akbar Radi’s “Hamlet with Season Salad” in Sahneh magazine. Tehrani has also designed sets and lighting for numerous plays, including Ali Abedi’s Gadfly and Wedding in shadow, Hossein Mahkam’s Silence, Zahra Sabri’s Earth and wheel, Shahab Al-Din Hosseinpour’s the Chieftain’s sorrowful widows, and Bahareh Rahnama’s The Other.