June 12, 2024 • 31 mins
As the show’s producers take a dangerous trip to recruit talent from across the country, Afghan Star becomes a target for a resurgent Taliban.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Episode five, Devil's Star. Habib Ami is tired. He's been
on the road for weeks now running auditions for the
new season of Afghan Star. He's just wrapped up his
(00:34):
work in Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban, and now
all he wants to do is head home. But there's
a problem.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
There was no flight from kandahart to Cobble.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Flights to Kabbo have been inconsistent, so instead Habib and
his colleagues will have to drive eight hours on the
highway with nothing to look at but long stretches of
deserted terrain broken up by far away mountain tims. But
(01:08):
it isn't the distance that makes him nervous.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
It was one of the most dangerous roads in Afghanistan.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
Habib joined Afghanistar three years ago. He thought it could
move the culture forward and sway a new generation away
from the Taliban. But now faced with this long drive
through treacherous terrain, it starts to sweat. Habib has heard
(01:39):
the rumors there are militants who hide out on this road.
He's heard they like to wave machine guns and stop
cars for quote inspections, and he knows that kidnappings along
the highway have become all too common.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
If fakefoot have caught us looking at these STAPs and
the cameras, it could be very dangerous for us.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
To protect themselves, they take some simple precautions. They dress
in traditional Afghan clothes, a shirt that comes down to
the knees and matching pants, and they bury the mountain
of tapes and equipment deep in the trunk of the car.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
We rented a small car and we started the trip.
Everybody was quiet, everybody was scared, and nobody wanted to
stop to eat something or take a break.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
Staring out of the window, scanning the landscape for men
with guns. Abib is on edge for the entire drive,
all eight hours of it, and all he can think is.
Speaker 2 (02:55):
Maybe this society is not changing, Maybe we are not
on the right path. Maybe we are not bringing that change,
or we were hoping too much.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
I'm John Legend and from Kaleidoscope, and iHeart this is Afghanistar. Previously,
a female contestant named Satara danced on stage.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
This is for the first time after the Tolerman that
a woman is singing and dancing on the stage.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
Which incided a wave of backlash against the show and
everyone involved in making it.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
I was next shocked. The reaction was so big. You're
not from us. We don't want to hear if you
want to walk into this province, you want to shot.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
You did the recruiting game. The producers of Afghanstar had
tried to put the last season behind them. They tried
to move past the fact that Satara danced in season
(04:13):
three that during her dance her veil dropped from her head,
exposing her hair. They knew that parts of the country
would be outraged by the spectacle, that they'd see it
as haram. In some ways, it was no different than
how US audiences reacted to Elvis's hit Swiveling on Ed Sullivan.
Speaker 4 (04:37):
Elvis, or the interracial kiss on Star Trek, or Ellen's
coming out on her sitcom.
Speaker 5 (04:53):
I'm So Afraid to tell people I mean Susan, I'm gay.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
TV pushed the boundaries of what society was ready for,
except in Afghanistan. Satara's episode put people's lives at risk,
and suddenly every female contestant knew that going on Afghanistar
was dangerous. So in two thousand and eight, the production team,
(05:23):
led by Daoud and Habib, started auditions for season four
and they took the show right into the dragons den,
the center of the chaos, Satara's hometown of Harat. As
you can imagine, a pushback was immediate.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
We had problems with their religious leaders. They were trying
to not let Afghanistan happen. There were a lot of
protests in Herod. It was a very very direct message
and a direct threat to us.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
Screaming for Daoud and Habid to leave, to never bring
Afghan Star there again. But Daoud and Habib refuse to
give up.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
If we stop audition in one part of the country,
then Afghanistan is not what we wanted.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
And even though they're scared, they have to show strength.
They need to tell people it's okay to audition for Afghanstar.
You don't need to be scared. But then something odd happens.
Daoud starts getting calls from politicians.
Speaker 3 (06:35):
Governors were inviting us and bag us to come. Everything
is on us. The hotel, the food, the security, the area,
the place, whatever you want it on us.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Daoud's thinking, what's going on here? Why are they suddenly
so desperate for Afghanstar to come, And then he realizes
the governors are trying to tell the producers that if
the Afghanistan team doesn't come to their district, it shows
that governors have no control.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
People will think these areas are under the Toliban.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
That's right, the Taliban. Because it's been seven years since
the American invasion, seven years since the Taliban regime collapsed,
and Afghanistan is beginning to fall apart. You still see
rubble everywhere and the people are living in it without
(07:38):
electricity or clean water. In the aftermath of the American invasion,
America had promised to rebuild Afghanistan.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
We're working hard in Afghanistan. We're clearing mind fields, we're
rebuilding roads, we're improving medical care.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
But corruption was rampant. The kickbacks are undercutting efforts to
increase the public's trust in the US military and the
Afghan government. Billions of dollars were diverted into the coffers
of warlords. These warlords are out for themselves.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
They run their regions like fiefdoms.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
And as the war went on, American airstrikes killed thousands
of Afghan civilians.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
These Afghans searched for dead bodies after a US air
strike hit a wedding.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
Party, husbands, fathers, mothers, wives, and many, many children.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
The youngest was just three months old.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
More and more innocent people were locked up and disappeared.
Speaker 3 (08:42):
At ten at night, they came with the cables. They
came to my house and arrested me in front of
my guests.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
They said I was with the enemy. Outrage on the
ground grew, and that outrage it bred hatred, hatred of
the Americans, and the fact that the country felt a
lot more dangerous now than it used to be. It
(09:15):
was a country divided, divided between cities like Kabo, where
young people embraced change, and rural areas where people started
to think maybe things weren't so bad before. And so
support for the Taliban quietly started to increase, and by
two thousand and eight they had established a foothold across
(09:38):
rural Afghanistan. That's the world that Daoud and Habib are
walking into when they go to hold auditions, a world
where it's not just Satara who isn't safe, it's also them.
Speaker 3 (09:54):
Lots of things happened, lots of suiciet bumming happened. In
a one son.
Speaker 6 (10:00):
Outside the wall of the embassy, rocked the Afghan capitals.
Speaker 3 (10:04):
And the people were killed, and.
Speaker 6 (10:06):
The explosion left a trail of destruction and casualties in
the area.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
Journalists were killed, people were threatened.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Chapter two, The Star of Sun Dance. Somehow Daoud and
Habib got through the auditions for season four of Afghan Star.
They beat up security and went to towns and provinces
all around Afghanistan. They went from Harat to Jalalabad to Kandahar,
(10:57):
and they escorted the audition tapes safely on that long
drive home without getting stopped or harassed or kidnapped. And
then in January two thousand and nine, in the middle
of producing season four of Afghan Star, Daoud gets an
(11:18):
opportunity he can't pass up. He's invited to go to
America to the Sundance Film Festival to attend the premiere
of a documentary some filmmakers have been making about Afghan Star.
So he asks his bosses if he can go, and
(11:38):
they say fine, have fun, and he leaves his young
protege Habib in charge.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Divide in the middle of the season and everybody was
panicking because Thwood was the making the creative decisions. He
was a kind of director and producer at the same time.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Dwood's coming back in a couple of weeks, so Habib
just needs to keep things going until then. It's stressful,
but he thinks he can manage.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
Maybe I was the youngest in the team with least experience.
I had to manage a big production team mostly more
aged people, so it was very, very, very challenging.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
Meanwhile, Daoud is having the time of his life. Finally,
after three hard years of making Afghanistar day and night,
he's having a break. He's in America and he's about
to watch a film at the most storied film festival
in America, and he's the star. Daoude settles down into
(12:52):
his seat. The auditorium is packed. He can't believe everyone
is here to see his story. He watches as a
younger version of himself Prance, is into action on the screen.
Then he steals a glance around him to see how
(13:12):
the other people are reacting. People laugh, they gasp, they
whisper to one another. He feels like he's finally made it,
and then something happens on the screen that makes his
stomach lurch.
Speaker 3 (13:32):
I said something against Doliban. Yeah, I want to say
if Dolavan is finished.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Daoud feels sick as he listens to himself talking. He
knows that the Taliban.
Speaker 3 (13:53):
Are getting stronger day by day, year by year.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
And he realizes this film could expose him, make him vulnerable.
Speaker 3 (14:02):
This is the guy that came up with this dirty
idea and immorality in this country.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
All of a sudden, sitting in that darkened cinema, he
starts to panic. Afghanistar is bigger than it has ever been.
Daoud is at sun Dance. He's being interviewed by the
international press.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
New York Times, Al Jazeera, lots of other news outlets
interviewed me, talked about my background, what I did, this movie,
this This was an international news at that time.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
This is everything he ever dreamed of as a child.
He is Afghanistan's greatest showman. But right now Daoud can't
enjoy any of it. He feels exposed.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
I worked very hard. I've won was like my own show,
but I was living in the same poorhouse for the
entire time that I was hosting that show. My house
was not secure. I didn't even have electricity for most
of the time that I lived there. It was so
(15:19):
easy for anyone to have access to my home and
do anything they wanted.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
And so he makes a decision.
Speaker 3 (15:27):
Honestly, one of the hardest decisions of my life.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
And eventually word gets back to Habib.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
He didn't tell me, he didn't tell anybody. He just
disapt yet.
Speaker 1 (15:50):
Chapter three, The Things We Carry. In two thousand and nine,
Daou Sidiki left Afghanistan for ever. He didn't tell anyone
back home. He just disappeared. It wasn't an easy decision. Remember,
Daoud is the director and the host of Afghanistar. It
(16:12):
was his whole life, and so it hurt abandoning this
beautiful thing he'd created, abandoning his country. But even more
than that, he was crushed by how his fans reacted.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
The name that I had and the celebrity status became
something like a poison. I was criticized by almost ninety
nine percent of my fans and say, you're just they
just sold your land, You just lift your people, your cheat,
(16:58):
your liar. It hurted me a lot. I was in
some point I didn't want to face any Afghan because
when they see me, they would say, oh my god,
why do you left. You did a very bad thing.
Until today, it just criticized me.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
But knowing what Daoud knew, he just couldn't stay.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
At the beginning, I was so eager. I thought of
Wonston is in its best time ever. We will never
see war again. The entire world is in our favor
and our support. Aving government is rebuilding slowly, slowly, getting
our country back. And we were so eagerly working for that.
(17:48):
But after two thousand and seven, I can say after
two three years, then I realized, no, the situation is
getting a little bit scary.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
For a second. Remember everything you know about Daoud. He
grew up under the Taliban. He watched the Taliban destroy
cassette tapes and record players and televisions. He saw his
neighbors smash their own music collections and burn their beloved instruments.
He was forced to grow his beard out and change
(18:23):
his clothes. He risked his life sneaking around just to
listen to the music he wanted to listen to and
watch the films he wanted to watch. So when he
saw the Taliban on the rise, he thought, I can't
live through this again.
Speaker 3 (18:44):
Sani bahasan kijo, the showy fucker.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
Money Bestudo sad and shunny sunny demas.
Speaker 3 (18:56):
Sound now sometimes I see maybe I am. I was
the first person to realize the situation is getting worst.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
Hey, it's John Legend. If you've been listening, you already
know that Afghan Star is a tale of resistance and hope.
For fifteen years, Afghan Star was a beacon, but when
the Taliban returned to power, they shut the show down
along with so many Afghan rights. They banned music, education
(19:35):
for girls and women, and they continue to clamp down
on everyone's freedoms. But there are ways to show your support.
We've teamed up with Awa Studios and their incredible graphic
artists to illustrate some of the most extraordinary moments in
this podcast. There is a unique print for each episode,
(19:57):
bringing to life powerful moments that are moving and inspiring,
and there's an unforgettable print based on a painting from
Superstar artist Raza that represents the spirit of hope embodied
by the show. Art and music have the power to
uplift us all, and ordering a work for yourself or
(20:19):
as a gift help support Afghans. With every purchase, we'll
be donating to the Nore Initiative, a nonprofit working to
ensure that every Afghan girl has access to education and opportunity.
For more information on our collaboration with aw A. The
artworks available to listeners, and to learn more about the
(20:42):
Nere Initiative's efforts to educate, support independent media, and transform
lives across the region, head to the link in our
show notes below, Chapter four, The Limits of Charm. After
(21:06):
Daoud left, eventually Afghanstar got up and running again. But
it turns out the show had a much bigger problem
than just a personnel issue because the Taliban are back.
Speaker 5 (21:18):
If you asked the Taliban member and a lot of people,
did you know what would you change the most in Afghanistan?
Some people would say Afghan Star.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
That's Sad Mohseni, the guy who set up Tolo TV
and the founder of Afghan Star, the guy who really
set in motion this whole cultural revolution that Afghan Star
is a part of. And so it is up to
him to defend what he has built from those who
want to destroy it. And actually Sad has kind of
(21:53):
been doing this from the get go. Ever since he
set up his TV network. People have been trying to
bring him down. It's just Sad is a relentless optimist
and he's a bit of an operator.
Speaker 5 (22:07):
When someone would tell me that the particular individual was
detailed against us, I would go and meet them.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
He's a people person, a smoother. If you scroll this
contacts list, he's got everyone from ambassadors to a list
comedians to poet laureates to fortune fifty CEOs in there.
He's good at winning people over. And it's this skill,
this secret weapon that SAD deploys to defend Afghanstar from attacks.
Speaker 5 (22:36):
We had these weekly meetings with members of Parliament and
they're starting with the people who were most against us.
So we tried to engage our critics as much as
possible and the use of charm, logic, whatever, or all
of the above, basically to convince them that we were
not their enemies and that what we were doing was
(22:57):
in the interest of the people.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
They complained about him airing Indian soap operas with religious
statues in the background, Hindu characters and big TV shows
and women showing too much skin. Even the President was
always calling to shout at him.
Speaker 5 (23:13):
He was always lecturing me about social norms and social conventions.
He said, you know, you have to take into account
what's acceptable in this society. I said, well, if it's
not acceptable to people, there's a remote control and you
can change the channel. So I laughed, of course, and
then he told his National security advisor, this man, he's
(23:33):
too much of smileness. I don't want to see him again.
Speaker 1 (23:39):
But despite the scrapes, Sad always manages to find a
way out. He keeps his soap operas on the air
by pixelating the exposed midriffs. He sends his younger brother,
who's a lawyer, to argue his way out of sticky situations.
And when the clerics get loud, he even reaches out
to religious leaders and says, hey, why don't we broadcast
your sermons on Friday night?
Speaker 5 (24:02):
And of course all of a sudden that was exciting
for them because that'd be there on television. Then they
would be vying for, you know, for the camera crew
to visit their mosques. So I think you have to
engage at all levels, and I think in particular with
your critics, you have to engage them, and you have
to talk to them, and you have to break bread
with them.
Speaker 1 (24:20):
And so when he starts receiving complaints from the Taliban
about Afghan Star, he thinks he can handle it the
way he's always handled it. He just called them up
to talk it out. After all, he's got the Taliban
on speed now too.
Speaker 5 (24:33):
They would actually call me personally and they would, you know,
we'd have these conversations, you know, and initially they would
introduce themselves, they'd ask about the family and everything, and
they were very always, very friendly. And then they would
always complain like, you know, we launched this attack against
the Americans and we killed like fifty Americans, always exaggerating, and.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
Sad would be like, are you sure it was fifty Americans?
It's like, would you believe thirty?
Speaker 5 (24:55):
You know, like, you know, we're negotiating in terms of
how many people they killed. It was almost comical.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
Sad knows the Taliban are posturing, they're bragging about numbers,
they're overstating their claims, but he also knows that Taliban
are a real threat and they hate Afghan Star. They
won't stop attacking the show, the music, the dancing, the women.
Speaker 5 (25:21):
I think it's called Devil's Star by some people.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
But Sad continues to talk to them, and they spend
a few years kind of circling around each other, a
bit like that meme of those two crabs on the beach,
Pencers out forever circling until one day in twenty fifteen,
(25:51):
when S'd's phone rings, it's the Taliban. They tell Sad
that they aren't happy with a news story that his company, TOTOTV,
has aired.
Speaker 5 (26:04):
The story related to the siege of a city in
the north of Afghanistan called Kunda's.
Speaker 1 (26:11):
Afghan security forces stretched to the limit as the Taliban
seized control of most if not all, of Kundu's, storming
the town from three sides at dawns. This is a
big turning point for the Taliban enemies.
Speaker 5 (26:25):
The city temporarily fell to the Taliban. The insurgents claimed
to have taken over several government buildings, a hospital, and
a jail where they freed hundreds of prisoners.
Speaker 1 (26:37):
It's the first time a city has fallen to the
Taliban since the American invasion in two thousand and one.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
It's one of the most serious losses in the nearly
fourteen year war with the Taliban.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
During the siege, the Taliban raided a hostel that usually
housed women's students.
Speaker 5 (26:56):
One of the Afghan intelligence officials off camera that there
were some female students in the hustle and they had
been attacked.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
The story was wrong. Sod's TV channel put out a
correction almost immediately.
Speaker 5 (27:14):
But the Taliban took exception to that story, saying that
he's done this on purpose.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
They think Sod's company is trying to make them look bad.
Of course, Sod isn't too worried. He thinks it's a
simple case of kissing the ring, showing real remorse and
promising it won't happen again. But to his horror, the
Taliban are not interested. After the capture of Kundus, they
(27:43):
feel more powerful, and so they do something terrifying, something
that shows Sod that whatever his skills at networking and
his contacts and his charm are his life, the lives
of his car and the cultural revolution are now in
severe danger.
Speaker 5 (28:06):
They issued the spatoir against us.
Speaker 6 (28:10):
It is known to everyone that alongside the military invasion
of Afghanistan by America, its intelligence operators simultaneously launched propaganda war,
during the course of which many so called free media
channels were propped up that is still being directly funded
by the American embassy. These networks encourage obscenity and lewdness,
(28:32):
inject the minds of youth with dangerous substances such as irreligiousness, immorality, violence, gambling,
intermixing and profanity, and specifically spread propaganda filled with hate.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Sad turns the page and what he reads next fills
him with shread.
Speaker 6 (28:55):
The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan from now onwards does not
recognize Hollow TV as a media outlet. It declares them
to be military targets which will be eliminated.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
Afghan Star is a Kaleidoscope production in collaboration with iHeart Podcasts,
produced by samas dot Audio and hosted by me John
Legend from samas dot Audio. The series producer is Mira Kumar.
Our executive producers are Joe Sykes and Dasha Listsina. Mixed
(29:58):
and sound designed by jo Imptman, Story editing by Joe
Sykes with original composition by Kyle Murdoch Recording engineer Tim mcclen.
Chapter artwork by Awa Studios from Kaleidoscope. The executive producers
(30:19):
are Kate Osborne, Mengesh, Kati, Kadur Oz Volisian and Costas
Linos from iHeart. The executive producers are Ali Perry and
Katrina Norbel. Social media by Darra Patts and Vahiny Shoori.
Special thanks to Tom Preston. Lizzie Jacobs, Will Pearson, Carrie Lieberman,
(30:41):
Nikki Etore, Bob Pittman, John Sykes, con O Byrne, Sad Mssenni,
and the Mussenni family, Matthew Anderson and Axo Alonzo.
Speaker 5 (31:00):
They do
Episode five, Devil's Star. Habib Ami is tired. He's been
on the road for weeks now running auditions for the
new season of Afghan Star. He's just wrapped up his
(00:34):
work in Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban, and now
all he wants to do is head home. But there's
a problem.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
There was no flight from kandahart to Cobble.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Flights to Kabbo have been inconsistent, so instead Habib and
his colleagues will have to drive eight hours on the
highway with nothing to look at but long stretches of
deserted terrain broken up by far away mountain tims. But
(01:08):
it isn't the distance that makes him nervous.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
It was one of the most dangerous roads in Afghanistan.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
Habib joined Afghanistar three years ago. He thought it could
move the culture forward and sway a new generation away
from the Taliban. But now faced with this long drive
through treacherous terrain, it starts to sweat. Habib has heard
(01:39):
the rumors there are militants who hide out on this road.
He's heard they like to wave machine guns and stop
cars for quote inspections, and he knows that kidnappings along
the highway have become all too common.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
If fakefoot have caught us looking at these STAPs and
the cameras, it could be very dangerous for us.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
To protect themselves, they take some simple precautions. They dress
in traditional Afghan clothes, a shirt that comes down to
the knees and matching pants, and they bury the mountain
of tapes and equipment deep in the trunk of the car.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
We rented a small car and we started the trip.
Everybody was quiet, everybody was scared, and nobody wanted to
stop to eat something or take a break.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
Staring out of the window, scanning the landscape for men
with guns. Abib is on edge for the entire drive,
all eight hours of it, and all he can think is.
Speaker 2 (02:55):
Maybe this society is not changing, Maybe we are not
on the right path. Maybe we are not bringing that change,
or we were hoping too much.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
I'm John Legend and from Kaleidoscope, and iHeart this is Afghanistar. Previously,
a female contestant named Satara danced on stage.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
This is for the first time after the Tolerman that
a woman is singing and dancing on the stage.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
Which incided a wave of backlash against the show and
everyone involved in making it.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
I was next shocked. The reaction was so big. You're
not from us. We don't want to hear if you
want to walk into this province, you want to shot.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
You did the recruiting game. The producers of Afghanstar had
tried to put the last season behind them. They tried
to move past the fact that Satara danced in season
(04:13):
three that during her dance her veil dropped from her head,
exposing her hair. They knew that parts of the country
would be outraged by the spectacle, that they'd see it
as haram. In some ways, it was no different than
how US audiences reacted to Elvis's hit Swiveling on Ed Sullivan.
Speaker 4 (04:37):
Elvis, or the interracial kiss on Star Trek, or Ellen's
coming out on her sitcom.
Speaker 5 (04:53):
I'm So Afraid to tell people I mean Susan, I'm gay.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
TV pushed the boundaries of what society was ready for,
except in Afghanistan. Satara's episode put people's lives at risk,
and suddenly every female contestant knew that going on Afghanistar
was dangerous. So in two thousand and eight, the production team,
(05:23):
led by Daoud and Habib, started auditions for season four
and they took the show right into the dragons den,
the center of the chaos, Satara's hometown of Harat. As
you can imagine, a pushback was immediate.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
We had problems with their religious leaders. They were trying
to not let Afghanistan happen. There were a lot of
protests in Herod. It was a very very direct message
and a direct threat to us.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
Screaming for Daoud and Habid to leave, to never bring
Afghan Star there again. But Daoud and Habib refuse to
give up.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
If we stop audition in one part of the country,
then Afghanistan is not what we wanted.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
And even though they're scared, they have to show strength.
They need to tell people it's okay to audition for Afghanstar.
You don't need to be scared. But then something odd happens.
Daoud starts getting calls from politicians.
Speaker 3 (06:35):
Governors were inviting us and bag us to come. Everything
is on us. The hotel, the food, the security, the area,
the place, whatever you want it on us.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Daoud's thinking, what's going on here? Why are they suddenly
so desperate for Afghanstar to come, And then he realizes
the governors are trying to tell the producers that if
the Afghanistan team doesn't come to their district, it shows
that governors have no control.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
People will think these areas are under the Toliban.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
That's right, the Taliban. Because it's been seven years since
the American invasion, seven years since the Taliban regime collapsed,
and Afghanistan is beginning to fall apart. You still see
rubble everywhere and the people are living in it without
(07:38):
electricity or clean water. In the aftermath of the American invasion,
America had promised to rebuild Afghanistan.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
We're working hard in Afghanistan. We're clearing mind fields, we're
rebuilding roads, we're improving medical care.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
But corruption was rampant. The kickbacks are undercutting efforts to
increase the public's trust in the US military and the
Afghan government. Billions of dollars were diverted into the coffers
of warlords. These warlords are out for themselves.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
They run their regions like fiefdoms.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
And as the war went on, American airstrikes killed thousands
of Afghan civilians.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
These Afghans searched for dead bodies after a US air
strike hit a wedding.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
Party, husbands, fathers, mothers, wives, and many, many children.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
The youngest was just three months old.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
More and more innocent people were locked up and disappeared.
Speaker 3 (08:42):
At ten at night, they came with the cables. They
came to my house and arrested me in front of
my guests.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
They said I was with the enemy. Outrage on the
ground grew, and that outrage it bred hatred, hatred of
the Americans, and the fact that the country felt a
lot more dangerous now than it used to be. It
(09:15):
was a country divided, divided between cities like Kabo, where
young people embraced change, and rural areas where people started
to think maybe things weren't so bad before. And so
support for the Taliban quietly started to increase, and by
two thousand and eight they had established a foothold across
(09:38):
rural Afghanistan. That's the world that Daoud and Habib are
walking into when they go to hold auditions, a world
where it's not just Satara who isn't safe, it's also them.
Speaker 3 (09:54):
Lots of things happened, lots of suiciet bumming happened. In
a one son.
Speaker 6 (10:00):
Outside the wall of the embassy, rocked the Afghan capitals.
Speaker 3 (10:04):
And the people were killed, and.
Speaker 6 (10:06):
The explosion left a trail of destruction and casualties in
the area.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
Journalists were killed, people were threatened.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Chapter two, The Star of Sun Dance. Somehow Daoud and
Habib got through the auditions for season four of Afghan Star.
They beat up security and went to towns and provinces
all around Afghanistan. They went from Harat to Jalalabad to Kandahar,
(10:57):
and they escorted the audition tapes safely on that long
drive home without getting stopped or harassed or kidnapped. And
then in January two thousand and nine, in the middle
of producing season four of Afghan Star, Daoud gets an
(11:18):
opportunity he can't pass up. He's invited to go to
America to the Sundance Film Festival to attend the premiere
of a documentary some filmmakers have been making about Afghan Star.
So he asks his bosses if he can go, and
(11:38):
they say fine, have fun, and he leaves his young
protege Habib in charge.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Divide in the middle of the season and everybody was
panicking because Thwood was the making the creative decisions. He
was a kind of director and producer at the same time.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Dwood's coming back in a couple of weeks, so Habib
just needs to keep things going until then. It's stressful,
but he thinks he can manage.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
Maybe I was the youngest in the team with least experience.
I had to manage a big production team mostly more
aged people, so it was very, very, very challenging.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
Meanwhile, Daoud is having the time of his life. Finally,
after three hard years of making Afghanistar day and night,
he's having a break. He's in America and he's about
to watch a film at the most storied film festival
in America, and he's the star. Daoude settles down into
(12:52):
his seat. The auditorium is packed. He can't believe everyone
is here to see his story. He watches as a
younger version of himself Prance, is into action on the screen.
Then he steals a glance around him to see how
(13:12):
the other people are reacting. People laugh, they gasp, they
whisper to one another. He feels like he's finally made it,
and then something happens on the screen that makes his
stomach lurch.
Speaker 3 (13:32):
I said something against Doliban. Yeah, I want to say
if Dolavan is finished.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Daoud feels sick as he listens to himself talking. He
knows that the Taliban.
Speaker 3 (13:53):
Are getting stronger day by day, year by year.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
And he realizes this film could expose him, make him vulnerable.
Speaker 3 (14:02):
This is the guy that came up with this dirty
idea and immorality in this country.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
All of a sudden, sitting in that darkened cinema, he
starts to panic. Afghanistar is bigger than it has ever been.
Daoud is at sun Dance. He's being interviewed by the
international press.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
New York Times, Al Jazeera, lots of other news outlets
interviewed me, talked about my background, what I did, this movie,
this This was an international news at that time.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
This is everything he ever dreamed of as a child.
He is Afghanistan's greatest showman. But right now Daoud can't
enjoy any of it. He feels exposed.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
I worked very hard. I've won was like my own show,
but I was living in the same poorhouse for the
entire time that I was hosting that show. My house
was not secure. I didn't even have electricity for most
of the time that I lived there. It was so
(15:19):
easy for anyone to have access to my home and
do anything they wanted.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
And so he makes a decision.
Speaker 3 (15:27):
Honestly, one of the hardest decisions of my life.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
And eventually word gets back to Habib.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
He didn't tell me, he didn't tell anybody. He just
disapt yet.
Speaker 1 (15:50):
Chapter three, The Things We Carry. In two thousand and nine,
Daou Sidiki left Afghanistan for ever. He didn't tell anyone
back home. He just disappeared. It wasn't an easy decision. Remember,
Daoud is the director and the host of Afghanistar. It
(16:12):
was his whole life, and so it hurt abandoning this
beautiful thing he'd created, abandoning his country. But even more
than that, he was crushed by how his fans reacted.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
The name that I had and the celebrity status became
something like a poison. I was criticized by almost ninety
nine percent of my fans and say, you're just they
just sold your land, You just lift your people, your cheat,
(16:58):
your liar. It hurted me a lot. I was in
some point I didn't want to face any Afghan because
when they see me, they would say, oh my god,
why do you left. You did a very bad thing.
Until today, it just criticized me.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
But knowing what Daoud knew, he just couldn't stay.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
At the beginning, I was so eager. I thought of
Wonston is in its best time ever. We will never
see war again. The entire world is in our favor
and our support. Aving government is rebuilding slowly, slowly, getting
our country back. And we were so eagerly working for that.
(17:48):
But after two thousand and seven, I can say after
two three years, then I realized, no, the situation is
getting a little bit scary.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
For a second. Remember everything you know about Daoud. He
grew up under the Taliban. He watched the Taliban destroy
cassette tapes and record players and televisions. He saw his
neighbors smash their own music collections and burn their beloved instruments.
He was forced to grow his beard out and change
(18:23):
his clothes. He risked his life sneaking around just to
listen to the music he wanted to listen to and
watch the films he wanted to watch. So when he
saw the Taliban on the rise, he thought, I can't
live through this again.
Speaker 3 (18:44):
Sani bahasan kijo, the showy fucker.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
Money Bestudo sad and shunny sunny demas.
Speaker 3 (18:56):
Sound now sometimes I see maybe I am. I was
the first person to realize the situation is getting worst.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
Hey, it's John Legend. If you've been listening, you already
know that Afghan Star is a tale of resistance and hope.
For fifteen years, Afghan Star was a beacon, but when
the Taliban returned to power, they shut the show down
along with so many Afghan rights. They banned music, education
(19:35):
for girls and women, and they continue to clamp down
on everyone's freedoms. But there are ways to show your support.
We've teamed up with Awa Studios and their incredible graphic
artists to illustrate some of the most extraordinary moments in
this podcast. There is a unique print for each episode,
(19:57):
bringing to life powerful moments that are moving and inspiring,
and there's an unforgettable print based on a painting from
Superstar artist Raza that represents the spirit of hope embodied
by the show. Art and music have the power to
uplift us all, and ordering a work for yourself or
(20:19):
as a gift help support Afghans. With every purchase, we'll
be donating to the Nore Initiative, a nonprofit working to
ensure that every Afghan girl has access to education and opportunity.
For more information on our collaboration with aw A. The
artworks available to listeners, and to learn more about the
(20:42):
Nere Initiative's efforts to educate, support independent media, and transform
lives across the region, head to the link in our
show notes below, Chapter four, The Limits of Charm. After
(21:06):
Daoud left, eventually Afghanstar got up and running again. But
it turns out the show had a much bigger problem
than just a personnel issue because the Taliban are back.
Speaker 5 (21:18):
If you asked the Taliban member and a lot of people,
did you know what would you change the most in Afghanistan?
Some people would say Afghan Star.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
That's Sad Mohseni, the guy who set up Tolo TV
and the founder of Afghan Star, the guy who really
set in motion this whole cultural revolution that Afghan Star
is a part of. And so it is up to
him to defend what he has built from those who
want to destroy it. And actually Sad has kind of
(21:53):
been doing this from the get go. Ever since he
set up his TV network. People have been trying to
bring him down. It's just Sad is a relentless optimist
and he's a bit of an operator.
Speaker 5 (22:07):
When someone would tell me that the particular individual was
detailed against us, I would go and meet them.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
He's a people person, a smoother. If you scroll this
contacts list, he's got everyone from ambassadors to a list
comedians to poet laureates to fortune fifty CEOs in there.
He's good at winning people over. And it's this skill,
this secret weapon that SAD deploys to defend Afghanstar from attacks.
Speaker 5 (22:36):
We had these weekly meetings with members of Parliament and
they're starting with the people who were most against us.
So we tried to engage our critics as much as
possible and the use of charm, logic, whatever, or all
of the above, basically to convince them that we were
not their enemies and that what we were doing was
(22:57):
in the interest of the people.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
They complained about him airing Indian soap operas with religious
statues in the background, Hindu characters and big TV shows
and women showing too much skin. Even the President was
always calling to shout at him.
Speaker 5 (23:13):
He was always lecturing me about social norms and social conventions.
He said, you know, you have to take into account
what's acceptable in this society. I said, well, if it's
not acceptable to people, there's a remote control and you
can change the channel. So I laughed, of course, and
then he told his National security advisor, this man, he's
(23:33):
too much of smileness. I don't want to see him again.
Speaker 1 (23:39):
But despite the scrapes, Sad always manages to find a
way out. He keeps his soap operas on the air
by pixelating the exposed midriffs. He sends his younger brother,
who's a lawyer, to argue his way out of sticky situations.
And when the clerics get loud, he even reaches out
to religious leaders and says, hey, why don't we broadcast
your sermons on Friday night?
Speaker 5 (24:02):
And of course all of a sudden that was exciting
for them because that'd be there on television. Then they
would be vying for, you know, for the camera crew
to visit their mosques. So I think you have to
engage at all levels, and I think in particular with
your critics, you have to engage them, and you have
to talk to them, and you have to break bread
with them.
Speaker 1 (24:20):
And so when he starts receiving complaints from the Taliban
about Afghan Star, he thinks he can handle it the
way he's always handled it. He just called them up
to talk it out. After all, he's got the Taliban
on speed now too.
Speaker 5 (24:33):
They would actually call me personally and they would, you know,
we'd have these conversations, you know, and initially they would
introduce themselves, they'd ask about the family and everything, and
they were very always, very friendly. And then they would
always complain like, you know, we launched this attack against
the Americans and we killed like fifty Americans, always exaggerating, and.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
Sad would be like, are you sure it was fifty Americans?
It's like, would you believe thirty?
Speaker 5 (24:55):
You know, like, you know, we're negotiating in terms of
how many people they killed. It was almost comical.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
Sad knows the Taliban are posturing, they're bragging about numbers,
they're overstating their claims, but he also knows that Taliban
are a real threat and they hate Afghan Star. They
won't stop attacking the show, the music, the dancing, the women.
Speaker 5 (25:21):
I think it's called Devil's Star by some people.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
But Sad continues to talk to them, and they spend
a few years kind of circling around each other, a
bit like that meme of those two crabs on the beach,
Pencers out forever circling until one day in twenty fifteen,
(25:51):
when S'd's phone rings, it's the Taliban. They tell Sad
that they aren't happy with a news story that his company, TOTOTV,
has aired.
Speaker 5 (26:04):
The story related to the siege of a city in
the north of Afghanistan called Kunda's.
Speaker 1 (26:11):
Afghan security forces stretched to the limit as the Taliban
seized control of most if not all, of Kundu's, storming
the town from three sides at dawns. This is a
big turning point for the Taliban enemies.
Speaker 5 (26:25):
The city temporarily fell to the Taliban. The insurgents claimed
to have taken over several government buildings, a hospital, and
a jail where they freed hundreds of prisoners.
Speaker 1 (26:37):
It's the first time a city has fallen to the
Taliban since the American invasion in two thousand and one.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
It's one of the most serious losses in the nearly
fourteen year war with the Taliban.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
During the siege, the Taliban raided a hostel that usually
housed women's students.
Speaker 5 (26:56):
One of the Afghan intelligence officials off camera that there
were some female students in the hustle and they had
been attacked.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
The story was wrong. Sod's TV channel put out a
correction almost immediately.
Speaker 5 (27:14):
But the Taliban took exception to that story, saying that
he's done this on purpose.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
They think Sod's company is trying to make them look bad.
Of course, Sod isn't too worried. He thinks it's a
simple case of kissing the ring, showing real remorse and
promising it won't happen again. But to his horror, the
Taliban are not interested. After the capture of Kundus, they
(27:43):
feel more powerful, and so they do something terrifying, something
that shows Sod that whatever his skills at networking and
his contacts and his charm are his life, the lives
of his car and the cultural revolution are now in
severe danger.
Speaker 5 (28:06):
They issued the spatoir against us.
Speaker 6 (28:10):
It is known to everyone that alongside the military invasion
of Afghanistan by America, its intelligence operators simultaneously launched propaganda war,
during the course of which many so called free media
channels were propped up that is still being directly funded
by the American embassy. These networks encourage obscenity and lewdness,
(28:32):
inject the minds of youth with dangerous substances such as irreligiousness, immorality, violence, gambling,
intermixing and profanity, and specifically spread propaganda filled with hate.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Sad turns the page and what he reads next fills
him with shread.
Speaker 6 (28:55):
The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan from now onwards does not
recognize Hollow TV as a media outlet. It declares them
to be military targets which will be eliminated.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
Afghan Star is a Kaleidoscope production in collaboration with iHeart Podcasts,
produced by samas dot Audio and hosted by me John
Legend from samas dot Audio. The series producer is Mira Kumar.
Our executive producers are Joe Sykes and Dasha Listsina. Mixed
(29:58):
and sound designed by jo Imptman, Story editing by Joe
Sykes with original composition by Kyle Murdoch Recording engineer Tim mcclen.
Chapter artwork by Awa Studios from Kaleidoscope. The executive producers
(30:19):
are Kate Osborne, Mengesh, Kati, Kadur Oz Volisian and Costas
Linos from iHeart. The executive producers are Ali Perry and
Katrina Norbel. Social media by Darra Patts and Vahiny Shoori.
Special thanks to Tom Preston. Lizzie Jacobs, Will Pearson, Carrie Lieberman,
(30:41):
Nikki Etore, Bob Pittman, John Sykes, con O Byrne, Sad Mssenni,
and the Mussenni family, Matthew Anderson and Axo Alonzo.
Speaker 5 (31:00):
They do
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