TAKING CENTRE STAGE
Students of St Stephen’s College perform a one act play at the Doon School, Dehradun.
Two elite educational institutions of the country had a cultural exchange of sorts when St Stephen’s College, Delhi performed a play at the Doon School, Dehradun recently. The play was put up at the request of Shrey Nagalia, who is the master- in- charge of dramatics at the Doon School. The young boys at Doon, or Doscos as they are called, seemed to love every bit of the action with some, perhaps, also watching with dreams of attending the prestigious college in the near future.
The one act play staged was The Dumb Waiter written by British Nobel laureate Harold Pinter in 1957 and said to be influenced by Samuel Beckett’s masterpiece Waiting For Godot. It is set in a small basement room somewhere in England and the play revolves around two hit- men, Ben and Gus who have been given orders to wait in the room for their next assignment. The stagnant and almost claustrophobic ambience of the play leads to the junior partner Gus constantly trying to break the overwhelming monotony of the situation. However Ben, the senior partner, is more keen on maintaining the current status quo and is often seen to lose his temper as a result of Gus’ constant and nagging small talk.
The cast from St Stephen’s included Nidhaanjit Jain as Ben and Ajit Deshpande as Gus. The direction was done by Ankit Sharma and John Koshy.
The Dumb Waiter play was also the inspiration behind the popular 2008 British black comedy film In Bruges which stars Colin Farrell, Brendon Glesson and Ralph Fiennes
Staging plays is one of many extracurricular activities that Doscos participate in. Photography, aeromodelling, music and carpentry are a few of the other activities that are on offer.