I wrote letters to college friends describing the play about the Trojan War I had just directed with a huge budget and a multinational cast. We had sold out over 200 seats for ten performances, despite being urged by the US and British embassies to cancel the run. Wilfully oblivious to the security threat to foreigners collecting in public spaces, I was giddy with the prospects for my theatre career. With the influx of over 50,000 expatriates to Tehran, the city was burgeoning into a pleasure dome for English-speaking entertainment-seekers. I wrote to a friend that I would be directing Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera in the autumn and postponing grad school indefinitely.
By the third day at the Caspian, the three of us were in a pleasant stupor but looking forward to the many guests due to arrive at the weekend. We remembered it was time to drive into the village and call my father from the public phone in the post office. We had the usual friendly exchanges with the locals standing in line with us.
When we finally connected with Dad, his tone was grim. He told us about the burning down of Cinema Rex in Abadan. Nearly 500 movie goers had been locked into the theatre and incinerated. Nobody knew who had done it. Dad asked us to pick him up the next day at Ramsar airport, along the coast. We uneasily told him we had invited some friends up for the weekend, but he sounded up for a party.