Two short length plays by Kathakriti

 

Two short length plays by Kathakriti

Kathakriti staged two short length plays at Girish Mancha in February this year as their latest production. The first of these, Ekta Galpo Shunbe… (Will You Listen to a Story…) is adapted from Krishnachura, a poetical drama penned by Shyamal Ghosh. It was a pleasant experience for the viewers to watch the play very well crafted by Sanjib Roy. The script, too, was done by Sanjib. The storyline centres around a middle-aged man and a woman who loved each other during their college days suddenly chance to meet each other in front of New Market. They had once dated in a caffe, or at Outram Ghat, or in the Maidan under a Krishnachura tree. They decide to revisit those days at the same caffe, on the strands of the Hooghly River and under the same tree in the Maidan. the storyline has no dramatic twists nor any punches or any climactic points to make the viewers engrossed. But even so Sanjib’s building up of the play together with the subtle expressions of the emotions of the two characters compel the viewers to share the nostalgia. Sanjib touches a sort of metaphorical note in mixing the yester years of the couple with the present time. He mounts the play taking a non-conventional path in his mounting of the scenes where in the back projection the different sites like the caffe, the river side or the Maidan is presented while the couple is stationed on one side of the stage and their young age is presented on the other side. With the help of a female commentator-like character reciting poetry and the woman’s inner soul singing songs, he bridges the time, as if. The sequences are so aesthetically composed that they seem to come out of a framed painting.

The aged couple are exquisitely portrayed by Sharmila Basu and Siddhartha Chakraborty. The young ages were presented by Sneha Mitra and Abhirup Choudhury. Himi Sharma’s rendering of songs and Bingsati Basu’s poetry gave the production its finesse. Sanjib’ stage design was aptly executed by Madan Haldar, while Souvik Bhattacharya’s lights and background score designs were commendable. 

The second work, The Hidden Sin, is a Bengali translation done by Debabrata Dasgupta, of James Yaffe’s adaptation named The Deadly Game of the Swiss writer Friederich Durenmatt’s novel ‘A Dangerous Game’. On a stormy night a person takes refuge at the house of a retired Judge where apart from the Judge three other persons are also present. These three are a retired Public Prosecutor, a Defense Attorney and a hang-man. The Judge and his three associates meet there everyday to play a game of mock trial whenever a stranger comes in, accusing the later of a crime. The game starts with arguments and counter arguments the result of which it is revealed that the stranger is responsible for the death of his boss. Though Sanjib builds up the dramatic sequences with care, but the desired impact remains missing. The fault lies greatly on the script that hampers the run of the play as well as fails in the reasonings of many a point. Especially in our Indian set-up the hangman dose not fit into the frame. The executioner in the Western society is far from the societal background of an Indian hang-man. This character could have been treated in a more rational way. But the performance of Kajal Shambhu deserves kudos. Bidyut Chakraborty’s Stranger or Souvik Bhattacharya’s Prosecutor were well executed. Sanjib acted as the Judge. But Abhirup Choudhury’s Defense Attorney was much wanting. The stage design by Sanjib and lights by Jayanta Mukhopadhyay brought out the right mood on the stage.