THEATER REVIEW : Cornerstone’s ‘Ghurba’ Intriguing but Pulls Punches : LOS ANGELES FESTIVAL: “Home, Place and Memory” A City-Wide Arts Fest

The road to “Ghurba” is a sensual one. Filled with the evocative sights, intoxicating music and even the piquant smells of L.A. Arab-American culture, this Cornerstone production is enticing to Arab and non-Arab alike. But graceful and gentle as the Los Angeles Festival entry may be, it also pulls some important punches.

Playwright-director Shishir Kurup--the first outside director to be brought in by this company that’s known for its community residencies that mix amateurs with professional actors--created the work with Cornerstone and the Arab arts organization Al-Funun Al-Arabiya. The cast successfully integrates Cornerstone regulars with other professional and novice performers, the majority of whom are Arab-American.

Kurup’s eclectic “on-the-road” story is set on a path leading to the fictional Ghurba (pronounced “Hor-bah”). The text draws on sources as disparate as William Butler Yeat’s “Purgatory,” Mahmoud Darwish’s verses and actual stories of immigrant Arabs in a pleasant, well-performed and deftly-orchestrated collage held together by several recurring narratives.

One of these stories--and the frame for the piece as a whole--is that of a displaced Palestinian (the enthralling but underused Ismael Kanater) who leaves his young daughter Jenin (Rana Sallakian) near a fountain, in the care of a nearby vendor (folksy Cornerstone regular Benajah Cobb), while he goes on ahead to prepare his home. In one of the play’s most resonant images, Jenin ages in her father’s absence. Progressively older performers don the character’s scarf and identity, until she is an old man (George Haddad) whom her father can no longer recognize.

Other key stories include excerpts from Yeat’s poem about a father and son standing in front of an old house where tragedy has taken place, and a toothless little tale about a modern couple who elope and get married. The Yeats is among the most striking moments in the production, thanks largely to Kanater’s visceral, snarling performance. But the wedding story could make its familiar point much more quickly.

All told, there’s as much as 40 minutes of fat in this otherwise elegantly crafted work. In fact, most of the second act--including the bulk of the protracted wedding sequence--could go.

It’s partly the filler that leaves you with the feeling that Kurup has willfully avoided trickier yet obvious terrain. Most important, as a piece that sets itself up to deal with the largely unknown and diverse Arab-American experience in L.A., the choice not to confront the cultural Other (Jews, Israelis, whites) is more than a casual omission.

* “Ghurba,” Studio 1340, MacGowan Hall, UCLA, Westwood, Thursdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m., Sundays 2 p.m. Ends Sept. 26. $7. (800) FEST-TIX. Running time: 2 hours, 30 minutes.