The Strangest

The Strangest is a theatrical work that imagines the history of the largely anonymous Arab murder victim in Albert Camus’s masterpiece The Stranger. A murder mystery set in French Algiers, the audience is informed at the start of the play that one of two Algerian brothers will end up being inexplicably gunned down on a beach by the French narrator of The Stranger. The elder brother is a gentle artist, ardent supporter of Arab women’s rights, and a friend to all humanity. The younger is a thug, finds his brother cloying, and repeatedly threatens to kill him. Absurdism is at the core of this story, since the audience is aware that the bitter conflict between the brothers will ultimately be resolved by a random act of violence by an unknown Frenchman in a way that none of the characters could expect.