Meet the Artist: Havana Marking Finds Her Own Afghan Star
Afghan Star, which follows the highs and lows of the Afghani American Idol, explores the power of pop culture to change a country where, just eight years ago, singing in public was a crime.
Compared to the depressing news coming out of the country, we thought that this was a powerful story with hope."
– Afghan Star director Havana Marking
– Afghan Star director Havana Marking
Reality TV shows like "American Idol" arguably occupy a space near the bottom of our pop-culture barrel, but one country's guilty-pleasure dregs can be another's social breakthrough.
The documentary Afghan Star follows the contestants of an "Idol"-like series, also called Afghan Star, that airs to soaring popularity in the central Asian country. More than just a diversion from grinding poverty and non-stop war, the show proves to be a galvanizing social phenomenon and even a controversy of life-and-death proportions.
An Afghanistan-U.K. co-production, Afghan Star is directed by independent London-based producer and documentarian Havana Marking.
"In the West, we look down on reality TV like this. But in Afghanistan, it’s hugely powerful," she says.
In March 2008, the director traveled to Kabul to chronicle the taping of the latest season of the reality show. Her crew consisted of herself and her cameraman, Phil Stehbing, who doubled as the sound engineer.
"Life is easier in Afghanistan if you're a smaller team. You don’t draw attention to yourself," says Marking, referring to the country's kidnapping epidemic.
At its heart, Afghan Star explores the power of pop culture to change a country where just eight years ago, singing in public was a crime.
The TV series, like its U.S. counterpart, is a competitive singing contest in which viewers get to vote for their favorite contestants. The show features representatives from different ethnic groups sharing the stage peacefully, something that would have been unthinkable less than 10 years ago. But perhaps the film's most surprising sequences are those that follow some of the female contestants whose on-air presence elicits disapproval from all levels of society.
In one climactic scene, Setara, a young contestant from Herat, performs an act of defiance on stage after being voted off the show. Her act – which might seem silly and harmless to the Western viewer – angers conservative elders and progressive youths alike. There are threats against her life. The documentary follows her home to Heart, where she faces an uncertain reception from her family.
The documentary's two-person crew faced its own difficulties. An armed bodyguard was hired for location shooting. Electricity proved unreliable – on average, Kabul has only three hours of juice per day. This meant that commonplace tasks like lighting and charging the camera were extremely difficult.
The logistical limitations necessitated a surgical-strike mentality on the part of the director. "You have to go in and out. You can't ring in advance to say you’re coming. And you can't say, 'I'll be back tomorrow to shoot,'" explains Marking. The filmmaker partnered with Tolo TV, a commercial broadcaster that produces Afghan Star. The station allowed complete access to the taping of the series in exchange for sharing the rights to the documentary.
The director says that during production some colleagues criticized her decision to make a film about a trashy TV show.
"They told me that pop shows are rubbish," she recalls. "But shows like this are one of the fastest ways to reach people. What it's achieving in terms of change is more than an NGO [non-government organization] could do in a year. Compared to the depressing news coming out of the country, we thought that this was a powerful story with hope."
