Music and mortality meet onstage as ‘The Ruins’ premieres at the Guthrie
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How do you measure if you lived a full life?
For theatre artist and musician George Abud, the answer lies in small, personal things.
“What makes up life to me is connection, people, time, stillness, space, art. And art can be anything. Art can be viewing the world. Art can be thought. Art can be expression of any kind,” Abud said.
So Abud turned to what he knew best — theatre and music — to explore the question of a full life, beginning a play in 2020 to search for an answer.
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“We all possess the capacity for art, and I think we need to trust that's enough, and that because it is enough. If you feel you've lived a full life up to this point, it’s like that frees you for the rest of your life.” Abud said.
Five years later, the world premiere of the resulting show, “The Ruins,” opens this weekend at the Guthrie.
Blending music, aphorisms and poetry, the play reflects on one central question: If you were to die tomorrow, did you do what you wanted, say what you needed, and connect with the people who mattered?
He explores the question through two musicians, one played by Abud, who meet as strangers just days before the end of their lives.
They encounter questions of belonging, grief, risk, legacy and all the vulnerabilities that come with being human.
Opposite Abud is Sydney Shepherd. They met working on a musical production of “August Rush” in 2019, where they both were actor-musicians.
They became fast friends through their shared love of music. The way they talked about it became a starting point for exploring the play’s central question.
“A specific conversation between two musicians that are not dumbing down what they're talking about, but are talking as musicians to each other, but through music and their love for music, it very much parallels questions about life that anyone can be let into,” Abud said.
A play through music
Abud wrote “The Ruins” with Shepherd and himself in mind.
Both have been musicians since childhood. They see their instruments — Abud’s oud and Shepherd’s cello — as extensions of themselves, just like the characters in the play.
Abud grew up in a family of musicians. Four generations of oud players, in fact.
The oud, a North African and West Asian lute, has always been central to Abud’s life. He brings one with him wherever he goes, whether or not it’s for a show, because it reminds him of who he is.
“It kind of embodies my family and my history,” he says.
It’s something Shepherd can relate to. She began playing cello at age 7.
“The cello is such a grounded and, for lack of a better word, chill instrument. I feel like it's helped me balance my more fiery nature with a very earthy sound. And I feel like we complement each other really well,” Shepherd said.
“It's just my favorite instrument. It sounds like the human voice. You have to embrace it to play it.”
In the show, each musician plays a song that’s central to their life, helping the other find what they need to feel complete.
To choose these key moments in the show, Abud drew from his own life and Shepherd’s favorite songs.
He landed on “Al-Atlal,” which means “the Ruins” in Arabic, adapted from a poem by Egyptian poet Ibrahim Nagi by beloved actress and singer Umm Kulthum.
The poem is a journey through love, life and heartbreak, echoing the themes of the show.
“This song was the most epic love poem I'd ever heard, and I was just fascinated by it. And I was also fascinated by how the song, that was about love, and this great loss of love, was also exemplified as like a political anthem in the mid ’60s in the Arab world,” Abud said.
Shepherd’s character plays a piece by Connie Converse, a 1950s singer-songwriter. Converse has become a touchstone for Shepherd in her own life as a musician and member of the band Bandits on the Run.
Converse was known in the West Village music scene before she wrote goodbye letters to loved ones and vanished to start a new life.
“She was like, I'm leaving this life behind. I'm gonna go start a new somewhere else,” Shepherd said.
“It's really interesting that that kind of parallels this character who I'm playing, who's about to leave the earthly realm, and just thinking about, am I disappearing? What am I going to leave behind?”
A living, breathing show
Since Abud wrote the show, it has gone through readings and workshops over Zoom and in theatre spaces.
It was after a workshop in 2022 when their director and friend Osh Ashruf sent it to Joseph Haj at the Guthrie.
“When you send plays to large figures like Joe Haj, you don't necessarily expect to hear an answer very quickly, because these people are some of the busiest people in our business,” Abud said.
“Joe Haj got back to us within two weeks, which shocked me, and he got back with such a thoughtful answer and a comment on the play. I was so thrilled by his confidence and his connection to the play.”
For the Guthrie, this is also the reopening of the Dowling Studio since it was closed in response to COVID-19.
In the 90-minute one-act performance in the round, Abud and Shepherd never leave the stage.
“It's very pared down, and it's all about the text and the relationship, and the stamina that's needed to keep the boat afloat is a lot,” Shepherd said.
The show covers a wide emotional range, mixing serious conversations about mortality with moments of humor and joy — something Shepherd has enjoyed exploring.
“It’s literally something that every single one of us has to go through, like no one escapes. No one gets out of life alive, and no one goes through life without losing someone. So it feels like a channel for a very human experience.”
