MACBETH – Shakespeare & Swapnasandhani
The first reference one gets of the
staging of a Bengali translated version of Shakespeare’s Macbeth is of an
attempt by Giris Ghosh after he took over the charge of the Minerva Theatre.
That was in the year 1893. It was an outright flop. The theatre-goers of the
then Calcutta did not like the production. Excepting for Ardhendu Sekhar
Mustafi who performed in four roles – Witch, Porter, Old man and Doctor – none
of the actors could satisfy the audience who were no less Giris fans. Later in
1897 Giris staged Hariraj, a Bengali adaptation of Hamlet – and it was an
instant success story. Giris had interpreted the failure of his Bengali Macbeth
as a failure on the part of the ‘uneducated and uninitiated’ Bengali viewers to
grasp Shakespeare. He also commented that the viewers were relieved to witness
Abu Hossain, the production that followed Macbeth. In 1919 the Bengali version
of Othello was equally rejected though the first night was a bumper. It was the
great thespian of that age Amar Dutta who could identify the main reason for
the audience apathy for some Shakespeare productions. He said that the viewers
loved and enjoyed the adapted versions instead of the translated ones. He
produced Saudagar, a Bengali adaptation of Merchant of Venice and it was a
hit. Whenever Shakespeare or for that
matter any foreign drama was adapted to an Indian setting to which the audience
could identify themselves – the production was a success.
One finds Sisirkumar Bhaduri in his long
association with the Bengali stage had never attempted a Shakespeare. In the
later years there have been a number of Bengali translated productions of Shakespeare,
Macbeth also being among them, and of
which this writer had seen a few – but
they have not registered in his memory as such. But it is also true that many of the original
Shakespeare plays have flopped in London itself. And among them are highly
starred productions like the one of no other than Sir Laurence Olivier. It is interesting to note that in the context
of the freeing of Haiti, Orson Welles produced his first stage production,
Voodoo Macbeth. And Akira Kurosowa’s The Throne of Blood has been a milestone
among classic movies.
Recently the Kolkata theatre scene is
witnessing a spurt of Shakespeare plays. Among them is Swapnasnadhani’s
Macbeth. The play has been adapted by Ujjwal Chattopadhyay. William
Shakespeare, it is believed wrote The Tragedy of Macbeth sometimes in 1605-06
and the earliest performance of the play is recorded sometimes in 1611.
What-so-ever, this play is regarded as the ‘bloodiest’ of all Shakespeare
tragedies as there are a number of cold-blooded murders all of which are
directly or indirectly committed by the ‘hero’, Macbeth. The portions of the original that have been
kept in Swapnasnadhani’s version have been aptly translated. Swapnasandhani as
a very serious group involved in theatre activism always attempts to mirror the
socio-political scenario prevailing in West Bengal. In this present production,
nonetheless, one never fails to identify the worthless, good-for-nothing Duncans in our polity, or
the over ambitious ‘immortal’ Macbeths, or the Lady Macbeths who help Macbeths
to achieve their aims and then they themselves commit suicide, or the Macduffs
who remove the Macbeths from the throne and put Malcolms instead, or who the
immature inept Malcolms are, who get the throne, rather by default. However,
one may say that the interpretation of the play as done by Swapnasadhani
without distorting the original structure, surely is one of the appropriate
ways to present Shakespeare to a non-Anglo audience.
In performing in Shakespearian roles
especially in the key ones, the actors are constantly challenged to keep to a
form of acting that would fit in to the contemporary style of acting without
treading on to melodramatics that the form of the play would always entertain.
The rhyming and the lyricism in the long monologues and dialogues in the
Elizabethan language tend to weigh heavily on the actors. This is equally true
in translated versions as well. All the various aspects of the art of acting
like, physical movements, facial
expressions, speech enunciation with appropriate diction keeping to the desired
syntactical form of the compositions, voice modulations and pitch variation, have
to be perfected in order to portray a Shakespearian
role such as that of Macbeth or the Lady. Undoubtedly, Koushik and Reshmi Sen
have proved just that to the Bengali theatre-world. Koushik has set a standard,
a benchmark, in portraying the pivotal role of a Shakespeare tragedy. The Bard
had created Macbeth as the hero whose ambition turns him into a villain, and
for whom he imbibes a pinch of remorse and empathy in the heart of the viewers which,
as a matter of fact give the play its tragic tone – Koushik has impeccably created this
multilayered complexion of the role. Kudos – unlimited – is for him. Reshmi had
a very difficult role to portray as the viewers would never have the slightest
feeling for Lady Macbeth who for them is an outright villain. Among all of
Shakespeare’s female characters the Lady is his cruellest and the most
complicated. A lady who is ready even to discard her feminity to make her
husband kill the King requires an actor who can bear a very heavy work-load on
the stage. Reshmi has made it with full confidence. Praises are galore for her.
As for the others, the actor, whose name
was not available, in the Porter’s role was praiseworthy. So were Siddhartha
Banerjee’s Banquo, Nabanita Basu Majumdar’s Gentlewoman waiting on the Lady,
Ashok Ghosh and Dibyendu Nath as the two Murderers. Kanchan Mullick’s Macduff,
Sushanta Basu’s Duncan and Subhro Saurav Das’s Malcolm were a bit weak
portrayals. Special mention should be made of Paramita Saha, Riddhi Sen
andSudarshan Chakravarty as the three Witches.
As Shakespeare has never elaborated on
the stage-settings in his plays, it requires imaginative planning, and
Soumik-Piyali’s stage and Joy Sen’s lights did well to create the perfect
ambience and give the required visual support. Gautam Ghosh’s music as well as
Reshmi Sen’s dress designing, too, enhanced the relevancy of the content. Koushik
Sen’s directorial capabilities reached another height in this production as
planning and execution were perfectly done for this magnum production.
Before signing off let me as a viewer
extend my deep apologies to the team for disruption created by a fellow viewer
who could not resist exchanging pleasantries with his acquaintance on the
cell-phone at the middle of a scene being performed on the stage. God help
us!!!!
