The Blasphemers' Banquet (1989)

The Blasphemers' Banquet is a film-poem created in 1989 by English poet and playwright Tony Harrison which examines censorship arising from religious issues. It was created in part as a response to the Salman Rushdie controversy surrounding his publication of The Satanic Verses. It was aired by the BBC 1‍‍ '​‍s programme Byline on 31 July 1989.

The verse-film is set at the Omar Khayyám restaurant in Bradford where Harrison is holding a banquet with invited guests such as Omar Khayyám, Salman Rushdie, Voltaire, Molière and Byron.

The film at the time of its airing created a controversy in Britain when then Archbishop of Canterbury Robert Runcie advised the BBC to postpone the showing of the film and the BBC writing a reply to him defending the airing of the broadcast.

Synopsis

The opening scene of the play shows a table inside the Omar Khayyám tandoori restaurant in Bradford, a converted Presbyterian church, where Harrison is holding a banquet with invited guests such as Omar Khayyám, Salman Rushdie, Voltaire, Molière and Lord Byron. Harrison appears sitting at the table drinking wine, expecting his guests and making a toast, in the name of Omar Khayyám, to Rushdie and all those who had experienced persecution on religious grounds. From the initial scene the audience is led to anticipate a feast.

Acteurs