‘Parviz Khatibi loved his country enough to tell it the truth’

By Leila Jarman 
Co-written by Caitlin Carlson

Reorient

Satire has the power to spark great controversy, illuminate injustice, and help bring forth social change. Throughout the 20th century, Parviz Khatibi was a clear voice of dissent in Iran, and his work encouraged people to always question what they often assumed to be the truth. An intellectual, playwright, filmmaker, composer, and lyricist, Khatibi’s 55-year career was unparalleled in his country. Deeply passionate about politics, as well as pop culture, the sum of his life’s work was a hybrid of the two. He was radical in confronting domestic sociopolitical affairs through his journalism and cartoons, while still appealing to the mainstream as an entertainer, intellectual, and public figure. Khatibi was relentless in his work, and prolific out of necessity, stopping at nothing to expose the hypocrisies of his society.

Khatibi was born in Tehran to a large upper-class family in 1922. His maternal grandfather, Mirza Reza Kermani – who assassinated the Qajar monarch Nasereddin Shah in 1896 – was a follower of the revolutionary cleric Seyyed Jamaleddin Afghani. At the age of 12, Khatibi began his career in journalism by writing satirical poems, and rode his bike to the offices of Towfigh – the most prominent satirical newspaper of the time – to submit them. By the time he was 17, he was the youngest Editor-in-Chief the publication had ever seen. As religious and political freedoms waned in the 1940s, an 18-year old Khatibi pushed Towfigh to produce more provocative content. The publication’s founders were arrested and forced to temper their messages; yet, unwilling to censor his work, Khatibi began publishing his own weekly paper, Bahram, in 1946, and later, Ali Baba. These papers were characteristically bold in their critiques and satires of Iranian social, political, and cultural figures and events, and were banned from publication numerous times, until forced to shut down indefinitely. Khatibi soon learned that if he wanted to avoid censorship, he would have to be more subtle in his approach, especially towards political and religious figures.

The 30s and 40s were a relatively cosmopolitan time in Iran, as a result of foreign influences. Artists returning from abroad brought European inspiration to the Iranian theatre scene, while plays saw elaborate sets and costume changes. During this time, Khatibi saw an opportunity to create something uniquely his own, yet characteristically Iranian. Taking inspiration from Charlie Chaplin and Maurice Chevalier, he wrote unique interpretations of a pishpardeh (lit. ‘before the curtain’, a comedic musical number) to perform between set changes, which soon became more popular than the plays themselves; theatregoers flocked to see his improvisational flair. Khatibi’s success gave him opportunities to write and produce full-length plays, which launched the careers of many actors in the process. Addressing Khatibi, the renowned Iranian actor Ezzatollah Entezami once remarked:

Parviz, only time will prove your greatness. Your incomparable genius will be rediscovered by future generations. You were the reflection of your own time. You dissected and evaluated the wallows of the grubby filth of society. I am honoured to have been able to be a tiny drop of water in the ocean of these events.

By 1941, Khatibi’s work in theatre caught the attention of Radio Tehran, Iran’s first national radio station. On his Friday morning show, he parodied popular songs of the time, improvising lyrics based on current events. The songs and radio plays left nothing untouched, from the nationalisation of oil and women roller-skaters to communism in the nearby Republic of Azerbaijan. This show put his voice in the homes of Iranians across the country, helping Khatibi reach more people than ever before and make his name a household one. Less than a decade later, in the late 40s, Iran was enjoying a period of freer religious, intellectual, and artistic expression, as the country’s political system became increasingly open. During this time, Khatibi turned his sights back to print and journalism, and published what is perhaps his most enduring accomplishment: Haji Baba.

The Haji Baba magazine was relentless, pushing the boundaries of politics, culture, tradition, and art, by going after any and all questionable figures and events to expose the hypocrisies, comedies, tragedies, and all-round humanity of Iranian society, as well as echoing public opinion. It quickly became one of the most popular papers of the time, with thousands of copies being sold each week. Jamshid Vahidi, a cartoonist and one-time colleague of Khatibi’s noted the shift in the latter’s work during the era in his memoirs. ‘With the publication of Haji Baba,’ Vahidi wrote, ‘Khatibi suddenly became a forerunner of political satire in Iran’.

In 1950, Khatibi was asked to write and direct Iran’s first comedy feature, Variet-e Bahari (The Spring Variety), which was also the first of the 37 feature films he would write, produce, and/or direct. He was the fifth person in the history of Iranian cinema to make a film, and the third to make a talkie. It was while working on Variet-e Bahari that he wandered into an editing booth and met his future wife, Zinat Moadab. A revolutionary figure in her own right – an actress, voiceover artist, radio personality, and Iran’s first female film editor – she and Khatibi soon married, and had three children together. Aside from his personal life, the 50s also marked a turning point in Khatibi’s professional life. At 32, he was a household name, having penned the lyrics to Bordi az Yadam (You Have Forgotten Me), one of the most iconic songs in the history of Persian pop, originally sung by the legendary Delkash and Vigen. Nonetheless, Khatibi continued to take risks in his work, always knowing that his next project could be his last >>> read more