Siroos Ghahremani and His Zoo

Older people in Shiraz still remember Siroos Ghahremani: a weird mixture of traditional “Ma’rekehgir”, Anthony Quin’s character in Fellini’s La Strada, with a touch of Hollywood and Italian ‘historic’ movies of the 1950s. In the early 1960s he established himself as the only star of his popular one-man show. He also made a small private “zoo” in Shiraz to make some money on the side by showing off his skinny malnourished animals caught in small cages.

Last year, while I was walking around Zand avenue, I saw some pictures of Siroos Ghahremani at a photo store’s window. I went in and bought a few digital copies of the available pictures. Some were digitally tinted, and some were still in original black and white.

These pictures show a glimpse of an era in Shiraz’ history, a period of transition from of an older life to another one. I still don’t understand many things in these pictures, like why the “Imperial” army and police forces are involved in his shows, or why people give him a “cup of victory” as the winner of a one-man competition. Nevertheless one still finds them interesting to see.