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Muslim Melodrama's
Signature Move
By liNDa laBaN
Fawzia Mirza, photo by Bradley Murray
M
uslim melodrama might not yet be a cinematic genre on
many American filmmakers or moviegoers' minds, but
that's how actor and writer Fawzia Mirza describes her
first feature film, Signature Move.
"I've been talking a lot about the genre Muslim melodrama
because, if you think about it, the film is sort of like if a telenovela
meets a Pakistani drama, but is comedic," Mirza says via phone
from her home in Chicago, in December.
That's one, or three, ways of describing Signature Move, which
follows the lives and interactions of a handful of women, some of
whom are Muslim, some of whom are Mexican, and some of whom
are gay. Dubbing the film Muslim, gay or even melodramatic sells
this movie very short, though.
