Aladdin Kokesh … a dramatic flame that goes out



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With the departure of Alaeddin Kokesh (1942-2020) yesterday, the index page was turned in the history of the main Syrian drama … the one that left a local mark will not be repeated. Although this unique director first belonged to black-and-white drama, his works were and continue to be an essential milestone in the roots of local drama that was not tainted by the wave of commercialization and fleeting signatures. Thus the name of this director was associated with the most influential television works, from “Al Qasr Al Qasr” (1970), through the series “Asaad Al Warraq” (1975), to “Al Qurban” (2014), and a long list of qualitative titles calling for the streets to be free of pedestrians. While watching some of these works. Half a century during which the owner of the “family experiences” followed the rhythm of the transformations of the Syrian dramatic scene, without losing the compass in choosing the north, achieving a dramatic dose that would not be easily forgotten, even if the play were Bedouin as “Ras Ghlais”. But what brought Ibn al-Qaymariya al-Dimashqi to the screen? Alaeddin Kokesh owes the formation of his cultural taste to his father’s huge library, and to the smell of the popular neighborhood with its different values, the heat that ends in the courtyard of the Umayyad Mosque, and the narrator of the Nawfara cafe, then establishing his personal library that he will later dedicate to the educational library, after finishing in his last years in A room in the “Home of the happiness of the elderly”. A long journey for a young Syrian television employee who used to paralyze his books wherever he went, saturated with warm values ​​on the one hand and eager to know the treasures of knowledge outside his walls. He abandoned his law studies to study philosophy at the University of Damascus, before being sent to Germany to receive a course in television directing, in the mid-1960s, and will put his first signature on the radio texts of Hikmat Mohsen prepared by Zakaria Tamer with the title “From Abu Rushdi’s Archive”. But his most outstanding work was “Memoirs of a thief”, then “Al Qasr Alley”, then “Asad Al Warraq”, then “The Westernization of Bani Hilal”, in addition to a group of works from the Levantine environment such as “Abu Kamel” , “People of the flag” and “Men Splendor.” Of course, the success of these works includes a rich cultural heritage, which we will not find today among the majority of directors, those who came to the profession without any knowledge of balance, except placing the hookah in front of the monitor and the spectator running in succession as if we were in an amateur football stadium. Alaa Kokesh had to gradually withdraw from the scene, stepping away from the chaos and death of the drama industry. The one who had served as a drama academy went into optional isolation, spending his last years in literary writing, performing stories, novels and plays with a rebellious spirit in the face of the conditions of decimated Syrian, watching the flame go out, in a war that overthrew the happy time that was the owner of “My Children’s” one of its creators. Of course, we will not forget his exceptional theatrical presence as director of the script for Saadallah and the news “The Elephant, King of Time” and “Summer Party of June 5”, as well as the greeting of director Mohamed Abdel Aziz to this teacher with a flash appearance on his latest series, “Chicago Street.”

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