The Powerhouse Of Talent

The world of drama has intrigued me all my life. During my childhood, the natural channel was the school dramatics. I remember enacting Alibaba during a drama class and getting a good score for it. As soon as I thought I was good enough to get a lead role in the upcoming  play for a drama competition, I got a role of a king’s guard and there I was holding a spearheaded stick and shouting my throats out announcing that the king is arriving at the court. This was it. There were no more dialogues.The night before I couldn’t sleep thinking how I could enact that scene differently so that it could catch eyeballs. Alas, my act did not have much scope and it had to go with a flat emotionless voice.Now when I think of this incident I feel how people playing a very small role or a blink and miss role in an act must be going through. There must be a feeling of an identity crisis but if these small parts do not exist then a play cannot be complete. Drama is ultimately a collection of a talent pool. One’s talent would get highlighted one day or the other irrespective of the length of the role one has. So, getting to play the protagonist would have its own advantage but supporting cast equally have the advantage to shine with their performances.

Back in the late 90s, I happened to watch a play named “Adrak ke Punjey” which won Guinness book of World record in 1984 for being the world’s longest running one-man show and it successfully ran for 35 long years until 2001. It had simple humour with a social message and with the original play being in Hyderabadi Dakhini language, it was shown in 27 different languages across 60 countries to around 30 million audiences. I was a school child then and what amazed me the most was the speed in which the actors changed their outfits backstage and returned back to the stage engrossed in their actions and completely indifferent to the change in their appearance. It amazed me that they came out unabated from the chaotic green room during their mini breaks between acts.

I always wonder what must be the success factor of certain plays which run successfully over many years or decades? One reason could, of course, be the play script and in my view, it is equally important to have coherence among the actors who need to not only hone their own performances but also support those enacting with them because ultimately any kind of shortcomings would result in the failure of the show. Think of a situation where one delivers a brilliant monologue and in the immediate scene, another actor forgets the lines or trips and falls on stage. It is a live show and any adverse reaction from the audience can affect the morale or the medical conditioning of the actors. Yes, they are humans too and they are bound to make mistakes but they cannot afford to lose as a team. If one person falters, it becomes the responsibility of the other to do the cover-up meticulously. I remember doing a play during my university days. There were no written scripts but we were all classmates and knew each other enough to enact freely as we felt right. Fortunately, we sailed through and managed to please the crowd with some funny moments.

In order to capture undivided attention of the audiences,there are shows including ballads or dances to keep audiences engaged to the performances. About five years back, my sister took me to a legendary broadway musical show in New York called “The Phantom Of The Opera”. Other than being excellent in the acting department, the actors were masters of music. They were singing live to thousands of audiences sitting and watching them with pin drop silence. It was completely surreal. I cannot imagine how many years of practice and hard work can give such results. The success of any drama is when it manages to transport you to their situation and story and you completely forget everything else going on in your life for those two or three hours. It engages you and you get completely engulfed and absorbed in their act.

In India, they have started experimenting musical drama at Kingdom of Dreams in Gurugram. I had been to their opening night about a decade back and it was all dance and music with dynamic changes of the stage set-up and huge screens on the either side for some special effects including some aerial acts. Last year, I experienced a new trend when I saw a new musical act at Kingdom of Dreams. They now try to engage people to participate too. So, there are volunteers from the audience showcasing their singing talent. Then there are instances, when the audiences are divided into two teams and handed over different coloured scarves and are asked to sway these when asked by the moderator. So, such things seem innovative but do these things make audiences to come again to watch the play?

I was watching the movie Birdman the other day which showcases difficult times for an artist who is in debt and has invested everything into a broadway production company. The protagonist gets entangled with growing concerns on the level of his performance and his diminishing popularity in the public eye. He strives to become a popular household name and not to die in anonymity. Like him, there must be thousands of actors who must be struggling to be identified or to be remunerated enough to continue their love for drama.

The world is changing and hence, the theatre companies continue to evolve with the changing times. The scripts need to be altered with a focus on the expected acceptance among a large percentage of audiences and playwrights play a very pivotal role. In a world where apps like Tik Tok showcasing talents in just about twelve seconds leverages on growing impatience among people, one needs to find new ways to entertain them and engage them for straight two hours. It does become an uphill task and I have full respect for people in the business of theatre. Every established actor who has branched out to other lucrative medium of entertainment do need to pay an ode to theater because this remains a common home to each of them some way or the other. It is the most selfless and forgiving medium where actors who do not find interesting opportunities outside return for their second innings craving for their lost popularity.

Audiences come and go. Dramas once popular move into oblivion. Everything evolves but the determination to give good entertainment never changes.This, in my opinion, is the soul of a theatre.

On the day the revered trustee of Mumbai’s Prithvi Theatre, Ms Jennifer Kapoor breathed her last, the theatre remained open for public. For the simple reason, that people may come and go but the show must go on.