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.
- Siroos Ghahremani
- Siroos Ghahremani
- With his lion
- On his lion
Towfigh was the most important satyrical weekly in the period between the 1953 coop deta and the 1978 revolution. It created a style of satirical writing which is still dominant among the satirical publications in Iran. The magazine was famous for its open criticism of the political establishment in the Sixties, but its political content gradually decreased by the end of the decade. By the early 1970s the weekly had to close down due to the pressures. The issue here is the Twofiq yearbook from 1970 (1349 Solar Hijri).
