The Theatre Olympics bring vernacular to the forefront

The 8th Theatre Olympics will fan out across the country to offer a national stage for indigenous theatrical forms, many for the first time. Avantika Bhuyan reports

Forcenturiesnow, Bhand Pather— a form of vernacular theatre— has been performed in village squares in Jam mu and Kashmir. Satire is at the heart of this form, which combines myths and legends with present-day social realities. A vibrant spectacle greets the audience, as performers move to the beats of the muka manddhol. Along whip, or koodar, is often a central prop, producing the sound of a gun shot and symbol is es oppression.

Now, this age-old form is travelling many miles—to Bhopal, as part of the 8 th Theatre Olympics, being hosted in India for the first time by Delhi’ s National School of Drama (NSD), across 17 cities including Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Bengaluru, Varanasi, Agartala, Jaipur and Jammu. Titled

AngrezP ather, the performance is directed by Manzo or Ahmed Mi rand performed by the Kashmir Performers Collective sin K ash miri.

The event will also showcase other folk forms, suchas Gondhal, practise din Maharashtra reportedly since the days of Shivaji, and Pan du ankeK ad de from Ha ryan a and Raj as than. Practitioners from village sand town sin and around Nan ded, Ujja in and Al war will present plays in Marathi, Bundeli, Marwari and Me wat ia swell. Audiences will also get a rare opportunity to see an O di a play, Nian, which features tribal artists from the state.

India hash ada rich history of vernacular theatre— from D odd at a in K ar nat aka, Kerala’s Koo di yatt am which is firmly rooted in temple traditions, the rustic entertainment of S wang from Ha ryan a and Utt ar Pradesh, and more. A paper by Say ali Indulk ar ,“Indian Folk Theatre: Instrumental in Independent India’ s SocioPolitical Transformations” from 2013, traces the changes that theatre has under gone in India—from being performed in courts and at festivals to becoming apart of contemporary

theatre practices. She writes :“By the early seventies, playwrights and directors had begun to incorporate folk convention sand ideas into their productions… During this time, theatre activists and playwrights struggled with how to create a modern theatre that would give an expression to an Indian identity, which synthesis ed the modern with the traditional and the indigenous.”

Thus, there was Di na Gandhi, who introduce db ha vai into modern plays. Habib Tan vi r’ s Nay a Theatre placed the sensibilities of folk artists at the centre of the creative process .“Ha bib sahib’ s plays, such as

Charandas Chor, are the finest specimens of this. Rat an T hi ya m and KN Panikkar also stand strong as faces of modern vernacular theatre ,” says Saurabh Anant of Vi ha an Socio Cultural Well being Society, Bhopal. Anant will present Hasy achoo dam a ni in Bun deli at the 8 th Theatre Olympics.

The big question is about the future. There are challenges, ofcourse, with villages lacking electricity and auditoriums, making it hard for practitioners to keep these forms alive. There’ s an overwhelming need for further state support of art and culture. However, Anant, for one, believes that there are huge possibilities for vernacular theatre, with young theatre artists getting alternate spaces. Nina sam in Heg go du ,350 ki lo metres from Bengaluru, for instance, is now a nursery for theatre practitioners to learn a blend of the traditional and the contemporary. It’ s an interesting time for theatre enthusiasts, with multiple experiments taking place, alternative platforms sp ringing up and many strains of per formativeness coming together. “A dialogue is happening between various forms, which is not geographic ally determined. For instance, Rajendra Panchal, who is based out of Kota and runs the group Pera Fin, has worked with Koo di yattam and Mo hi ni at tam alongside the narrative traditions of Raj as than. Then, there is Deep an Sivaraman, who uses They yam, butina contemporary juxtaposition ,” says Anuradha Kapur, former director of N SD. An example of this re configuration is Ab hi lash Pill ai’ s Talatum, an adaptation of The Temp est, which was performed at the Serendipity Arts Festival 2016 and was an exploration of various subaltern practices such as acrobatics, circus performance sand physical theatre, along with They yam .“These hybrids are charged with lots of energy,” says Kapur.

This heightened interest in vernacular theatre has also spur red research on the various forms—insights from these are further fuel ling experimentation and dialogue. “Academicians and practitioners are looking at how these forms have changed, say, with the arrival of mobile and digital technology. For instance, K ru ti R has spent time in Shiva mog ga (earlier Shimoga) in Karnataka, to research the transformations that take place when Yaks hagan a performances, which are traditionally night-long affairs, are reduced to two to three hours in the evenings ,” says Arund hati Ghosh, executive director, India Foundation for the Arts( IF A ).

K ru ti is studying how this change affects the training of actors. Sandesh Bhandare received an IF A grant in 2001 to photo document the lives of Tamas ha performers, which resulted in the book, Tamas ha: Ek Rangadi Gammat. He is now returning to the same places in K on kan, Vidarbh aand Mar a th wad a to see how the practice has changed further .“Often, these forms are looked upon as heritage. But they are not static —they are constantly changing and adapting, which makes them so interesting ,” says Ghosh.