Writer’s bloc is an
annual play writing workshop sponsored by the British council. The idea
behind writer’s bloc is to appreciate and promote the writers in an age
where the actors or directors try to don the centre space. After the
successful completion of the workshop 12 plays were finally born.
Writers are all young and energetic. They all portray the contemporary
society and its greyness. Rage theatre group, headed by Rajit Kapoor and
Shehnaz Patel, organised the Writers Bloc – 3 theatre festival in
Mumbai in January this year. Following its success, they are were in
Bangalore with 3 of the 12 plays which was showed on 17th, 18th and 19th Feb. They were
Spunk!
As
the name suggested it was an adult play, humorous and concerning the
gender. The synopsis is like, there is a guy who is a wannabe actor in
the day and a sperm donor by night. He, as per the experiments and
experience, has magical sperm that has only ‘Y’ chromosomes. Which
means, he can only give boy child. Next is his business partner – A
broke single mother working in a gynaecologists clinic running lucrative
male-chromosome business which is actually her main source of income.
She doesn’t have to try too hard, most of the couples buckles when they
are given a choice of a male child. They have been running this
business smoothly until this chap mistakenly spills his secret during an
audition following which the lady who was directing the audition starts
stalking him, and needless to say he falls for her and to the first
lady’s dismay that impacts their business drastically. Things soon goes
out of control as we see the darker side of all fantasies leading to a
tragic ending. This pokes at the latent weakness when it comes to gender
when they are given a choice. And how, the smell of money can drive
people to the boundaries where something harmless whilst illegal start
become vulgar and uncontrollable. Apart from this bit there had been
several scenes that just adds to the humour and flow of the play and
nothing more. Like the story of the second girl was rubbish, like she is
unhappy and consults a spiritual guru who points her to this chap with a
prediction that only he can make her happy. They were hilarious and as a
story they all gelled well and was hilarious and entertaining. But
there wasn’t anything take away idea from them. Needless to say all the
crew were exceptional. The play was written by Siddharth Kumar and was
directed by Akarsh Khurana
Pereira's Bakery on 76 Chapel Road
This
is the story of a street in Bandra and the people living there and how
their life is affected when they are served eviction notice to allow a
multi layer parking lot for the new shopping mall , by demolishing their
house. Story revolves around Pereira, his family and friends and his
bakery that was started by his grandfather and is now part of his family
legacy. The story initially resembled the Malayalam movie ‘Vietnam
Colony’, an employee from the construction company befriending Pereira’s
daughter and influence them to comply with the company’s wishes. But
play didn’t take the route of fantasy that movie imagined. The reality
is bleaker than what we would expect. The unending piling and
demolition, harassment from the land owner and construction company,
betrayal of friends and communities strain the bonds of friendship and
tests the endurance of humanity before the weak finally succumbing to
the onslaught of the powerful ones. The play wasn’t that bleak, it was
humorous. The characters were very lively and witty. Even till the last
minute there were enough stuff to tickle the funny bone, even when we
see them bearing and battling all that with their little vanity and
heroism. People can relocate, but legacies cannot. They simply get
buried under the rubbles. This subject, though had been written about,
movies made, plays enacted, there is always a gap. A gap which a person
who really get uprooted from their homes and the reader or viewer who
tries to get into their shoes and feel it. This play too fails to give
the proper impact. The bigot society needs a much stronger pinch to feel
how it is to bear someone arguing why they should give up their
existence for an ill-quantified economic development of unknown people.
The set was the key thing in this play, they had built a two storey
scaffolding to put the play and that was incredible. This play was
written by Ayesha Menon and was directed by Zafar Karachiwala.
Mahua
A
tribal joke goes like this “Heaven is a forest full of Mahua trees, and
hell is a forest full of Mahua trees with a forest guard”. Mahua in its
positive and negative impacts are shown as a central symbol to the
tribal traditions of Orissa. It says Mahua trees make them feel like
home. For gents, Mahua means liquor. The story takes us into the life of
few tribals and their struggle to live in the world where they are not
sure when they would be evicted for minerals, or be bombed by the army
testing camps in one of their testing mistakes or be rounded up for
being a maoist sympathiser. The play was in Hindi, raw with ample use of
expletives. The story goes like this, Birsa, an ordinary chap from the
village of Bihabund is caught for shooting arrow onto an old man from
the adjacent village. The punishment the panchayat pronounce is to marry
Birsa to Gilli, that old man’s unmarried daughter who is 12 years elder
than Birsa!. Mahua flows and the marriage woes and other funny moments
takes us into their life. But the cement companies have now got the
rights to mine and the villagers have to relocate. Their struggle to
oppose the move, is suppressed with state sponsored violence. One
friend joins the company seeking comfort while the other gets recruited
by Maoists. Birsa and Gilli relocates to the new unknown corrosive
terrain into the devilish toxic testing grounds that shakes their hut
and life. As life gets more difficult, they get into smuggling
unexploded arms. When one night a test bomb finds their already
dilapidated hut as target, Gilli is wounded and bedridden. Their misery
worsened and death was the only thing they wished for. The writer of
the play, Akash Mohimen drew his inspiration from the article from
P.Sainath’s ‘Everybody loves a good drought’. It was about the tribals
who were evicted for a limestone mine from their villages and
rehabilitated in a wasteland in the middle of Army’s arsenal testing
camps. The issue is a big question mark to the ideals boasted by the
nation, and to disfigured face of humanity in this country that has made
it a habit to view everything through the concept of development. The
play ends with a soul stirring folk song of Kheria tribe which
translates to this:
In the region of Hamko-Simko,
There came together the tribals of the forest.
Against the king and queen,
Against the taxes, they did protest.
There was no fight, there was no war,
As the queen ordered the soldiers to fire into the crowd.
Red blood flowed over, across the soil;
As the gunshots and cries, grew equally aloud.
They brought in motor trucks in large numbers,
And in them the bodies were loaded.
They took them to seeming,
And to Riaboda they were carried.
Until in Baamana a grave was dug,
And back into their beloved earth they were buried.
It
was great. The plays were all original. It shows the emergence of new
wave of Indian playwrights who are concerned with the social and
political state of events. These writers are all youngsters, doing
theatre as part time. The idea of promoting writers through such
festivals makes this even better. I guess they would be bringing the
remaining 9 plays too to Bangalore in instalments.
