One beneficial result of meeting Govind at the rehearsal last night was an invitation to a theatre production at his Institute this evening. There are few enough opportunities for such in Lucknow. so I was keen to take this chance. Rohit was accompanying me, and arrived at my apartment, where we transferred to a taxi. Whie we were waiting for it to arrive, there were a few drops of rain, next to nothing really. But within a minute or two of climbing aboard, we were engulfed by as big and powerful a storm as I can remember, sheets of rain, so much so that it was difficult to see… not that this prevented our driver from overtaking. It did, however, prevent Rohit’s wife and his extended in-law family from joining us as intended; they called to cry off. Very sensibly, in the circumstances. The journey from the car to the steps up to the building was no more that a few yards, but still the force of the storm was enough to give us both a thorough soaking, as we splashed our way through a deep puddle and into the theatre.
The theatre itself was impressive. It was not large, holding a couple of hundred or so, with comfortable seats fanning out and up from a stage which extended a little, arena-style, into the audience. There were comfortable, cinema-style seats, with the front row taken up as usual by sofas and tables; deference is all.
There were the normal opening formalities: a welcome speech (in Hindi, of course, as was the performance); the ceremonial lighting of the lamp; presenting the chief guests with scarves, and small plants in pots. (“Birnam Wood’s on the move again,” I whispered to Rohit. And then we began.
The play was a historical drama called Shivaji, about a Marathi warrior, and, I believe, Hindu hero, defending his kingdom from invading Mughals… or at least I think so. It was Shakespearean in tone, a huge cast playing out an epic tale. (Shakespearean in length too; over two hours without an interval. I cannot say I enjoyed it exactly; a long play in a foreign tongue was something of a challenge (and I confess I nodded off at one point), but it provided a fascinating insight into the theatre on offer here. Not that one should judge the entirety of Indian theatre on one production… especially such a flawed one.
I did enjoy the dances which punctuated the action, with a group of seven women and one man, featuring lots of whirling and spinning – they brought some welcome life and energy. The fight scenes likewise, though they were a little bit “by numbers”. And raised a smile, in me at least, when the dead rose and scuttled off stage. Shakespeare had such things better worked out.
The debit side is longer, I’m afraid. First off, everything miked up to the hilt: personal mikes attached to costumes, mikes on the floor, hanging mikes. Ludicrous in such a small theatre, but necessary since they had to compete with a pounding, booming soundtrack. Together, the impact was headache- inducing, with the added problem of sometimes one had no idea who was speaking, as their voices all emerged from speakers.
The production was well-funded, with a lot, I imagine, expended on a huge video screen which filled the back of the stage, and was used to present a series of backdrops: landscapes, with distant mountains and temples. (Very CMS, only more so.) On one occasion, there was a castle interior, complete with flickering, burning torches. It all added nothing but distraction, to my mind, and displayed no artistic talent or effort, since I am sure it was all created with a few clicks of an AI mouse. This quasi-naturalistic background was echoed by the set, It was an elaborate structure of ramps, doors, a central throne-room, and a high balcony (frequently occupied by guards in costume who seemed to be nothing more than decoration. But for every scene-change there was the same music, the same4 blast of smoke machines across the stage, and enormous pieces of furniture manhandled on and off the stage… and a new projected backdrop. Clearly, the audience could not be trusted to use their imaginations.
The acting was mixed – sometimes melodramatic, sometimes heroic, sometimes (especially for the baddies) broadly comic, almost pantomime… though the (very few) women were better than the men. This curious mixture fed in to perhaps the most insidious nature of the production: the fact that it was heavily funded by the government, and reflected the current government focus on Hindu nationalism. The comic bad guys were all Muslim, it seemed. But my favourite moment came right at the end, with the whole cast on stage, and there was presented, in a non-speaking role, a character who apparently represented the British Empire, wearing a floppy red tunic with enormous, even floppier white epaulettes, and a police helmet. We too were implicated, it seemed; Rohit and I found it difficult to contain our giggles.