Istvan Dugalin ➤

Parastoo Amanzadeh and Mina Zaghar in Sanguine | Photo by Zahra Saleki

“Always Act” 

This message, emblazoned in neon, looms in the background throughout the story. My eye was often drawn to it, as if it might hold some deeper meaning. Is it a call to action to be more actively engaged in the world? Or is it just an actor’s obsessive mantra? Either is fitting for these two young Iranian-Canadian women, passionate performers, who seem to exist only for the stage and each other. 

Sanguine, conceived and performed by Parastoo Amanzadeh and Mina Zaghari, presented by Cahoots Theatre Company, is attuned to both meanings of the word—an optimistic attitude in the face of adversity and a bloody shade of red. One of them is going blind, deaf and mute—will, eventually, die—from a brain tumour. One of the most beautifully awful bits of text here has Amanzadeh describing this invasive phenomenon as a school of tiny dark fish cluttering up her brain. While she makes plans to end her life on her own terms, Zaghari—angry, sad and domineering—scrambles to find innovative theatrical devices to allow her friend to continue performing.

An early bit of dialogue, in which they try to one-up each other in a game of who’s the poorest, is both cute and clever. They tally up the various items they never paid each other back for, but these monetary examples gradually give way to the emotional burdens they carry. Though it provides context, Zaghari’s script, for the most part, isn’t the strongest feature of Sanguine. It is the physical expression of their plight, their dancing, that really grounds the emotions of the story.

These dance sequences, insightfully choreographed by Amanzadeh, are, for me, the most compelling aspect—existing as both a part of their story and a device to tell it. The two most powerful segments are a solo piece on the upstage bed as Ananzadeh writhes about in abject submission to encroaching illness and the dream-logic frustration and yearning as Zaghari desperately tries to grab ahold of her friend—to take her away, to escape their fate.  

As she tries to accept the situation, to be artistically productive in her sadness, Zaghari communes with her hang drum. Her playing of the instrument near the end of this production is a truly stirring moment and a cathartic highlight.

Director Tanisha Taitt’s visually dynamic staging offers some simple yet evocative design elements. Sim Suzer’s set, with its depressing grey-scale palette, gives an impression of their meagre, poor artist digs. It isn’t the place that’s important though, it is how they inhabit it together. Christopher-Elizabeth’s lighting transforms the space with colour, allowing us to see how their home feels to them and how those feelings evolve. The bed trim glows with shifting colours in unison with the bedside lamp—a choice that feels gently psychedelic.  

As a heartfelt and semi-autobiographical examination of friendship, affliction and shared artistry, Sanguine seems, at first, a little naïve; but its playfulness and gentle potency snuck up on me.

Sanguine
running April 27 to May 10, 2025
The Theatre Centre, BMO Incubator (1115 Queen St. W)
running time: 65 minutes (no intermission)

Mina Zaghari and Parastoo Amanzadeh in Sanguine | Photo by Zahra Saleki