All the world’s a stage

Surekha spent her childhood in Almora ( U. P). Later, she attended the Aligarh Muslim University. While in AMU, Al Kazi ( ex- director National School of Drama) staged the play, King Lear, there. She filled up the NSD form that was being distributed and got into the drama academy in Delhi in 1968. “Al Kazi taught us how to raise our performance. He paid attention to detail. He’d do the lighting and music himself,” she reminisces. She worked with the NSD Repertory Company for over a decade. Her first play was the Greek tragedy, The Trojan Women in which she played Helen of Troy. Look Back In Anger and Cherry Orchard were her other popular plays. Prolific in theatre, she was given the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 1989.