Sunday, November 24, 2013

GODOT AAYA KYA?

Hindi adaptation of

Waiting for Godot

A play in two act by: 
Samuel Beckett

Adaptation, 
Scenography, 
And Direction: 
Satyabrata Rout

Produced by Rangakalpa Hyderabad, India.



This Hindi adaptation of the world classic play “Waiting for Godot” was originally written in French by the Irish born playwright Samuel Beckett, which has succeeded in establishing the trend of Theatre of Absurd in the world of dramatic literature.  


Rangakalpa:
Rangakalpa, is an amalgamation of diverse minds of people from various walks of life with definite objectives to reach to the various cultures, people and communities. Working in an academic environment, I realized the need to break the elitist tag, often labeled on the performing arts, particularly in theatre and our group has tried to break-through the conventions of theatre academics, in order to reach to the common man, to make him/ her aware of his/her responsibility in today’s society.


Understanding the fact that our time and society is being reflected directly through this art, Rangakalpa definitely works with a sense of commitment. Our aim is to achieve perfection and to break the dogmas of conventions, that drags our society towards conservatism, an obstacle to progress in all sense.











The Play:

Two people are waiting for Godot by a tree on a countryside road. They wait, wait and wait.... and the play ends. It ends in nothingness living on a chance whether Godot will come on the next day....

















The play speaks nothing, nor does it pass any social moral value... But within that nothingness many truths of our life unfold. Like Vladimir and Estragon, we all are waiting; for the reason unknown to us, living on a chance only, otherwise we cannot live.










This Hindi version of Waiting for Godot redefines the significance of human existence and tries to search for a deeper meaning of life. 



Our production gives emphasis on the hidden layers of human relationship and tries to search for a Godot who is nowhere but within our own self.. The adaptation focuses on the Indian mindset, for which lot of changes has been done with the characters & the storyline.









The purpose of human life is an unanswerable question. It seems impossible to find an answer because we don't know where to begin looking or whom to ask. Existence, to us, seems to be something imposed upon us by an unknown force. There is no apparent meaning to it, and yet we suffer as a result of it. The world seems utterly chaotic. 








We therefore try to impose meaning on it through pattern and fabricated purposes to distract ourselves from the fact that our situation is hopelessly unfathomable.



















"Waiting for Godot" is a play that captures this feeling and view of the world, and characterises it with archetypes that symbolise humanity and its behaviour when faced with this knowledge.











                                                              Samuel Beckett: The Playwright

Samuel Beckett, an avant-garde playwright, poet and novelist was born in Ireland in the year 1906. He wrote plays both in English and French languages. Almost all his works move around the meaninglessness of life and the significance of human existence which offer a tragicomic outlook from the outer structure on human culture, often termed as black comedy. Beckett is widely regarded as the most influential writers of the 20th century and considered as the father of postmodernism in dramatic literature. He is one of the prominent writers whose writings contribute to the concept of Theatre of the Absurd. Beckett was awarded Nobel Prize in 1969 in literature. He died in the year 1989.


Satyabrata Rout: The Director/Scenographer
Satyabrata Rout is a known name in the contemporary Indian theatre. A graduate from the National School of Drama with specialization in Design and Direction (1983), he worked as a Technical Director with Bharat Bhawan, Bhopal, for five years and then returned to NSD where he was associated in different capacities, first with the Theatre-in-Education project, then as a resource person for extension programme; and finally as lecturer in lighting. He joined as an Associate Professor in Scenography, at the University of Hyderabad in the year 2007.

Having a wide range of work experience with eminent personalities and directors from India and abroad, his productions bear his individual testimony and personal imprint. As a contemporary Designer and Director, Rout has done rigorous research and also practiced the traditional form of Orissa, “Chhau” which reflects in his productions, Passa, Rashomon, Urubhangam, Nagamandal, HayaVadan, A Midsummer Nights’ Dream, Karna Katha, Evam Indrajit, Iphigenia, etc. He has a long association with the legendary theatre philosopher, Sri B.V Karanth and has done his Ph.D on the thoughts and theories of Karanth. A recipient of several fellowships and awards, he has been conferred with Manoher Singh Smriti Samman for his contribution to modern theatre movement, by the Government of India in 2006. His recent plays Matte Eklavya bagged the best play of 2013, which conferred him with the Best-Director award by META (Mahindra and Mahindra Excellence in Theatre Award). Recently he has directed Nagamandala and Urubhangam in English for the students of East 15 Acting School at University of Essex, England. He has written books on theatre which includes; On the crossroads of Theatre and Space, Performances, Developing Design: An Indian Perspective. Presently he is doing an academic research on “New Direction Theory in Indian Theatre”. 





Cast:
Estragon: Vasudev Venkatraman

Vladimir:  Satyabrata Rout
Pozzooo: Ramanuj Dubey
Lucky: Avadesh Jha




CREDIT
Set and Lights: Smrutiranjan Biswal
Music: Krishna Kumhar
Props, Costume: Raj, Smruti
Production: Mrs. Mitanjali Rout
Stage manager: Roshan AB
Original Text: Samuel Beckett
Indian adaptation: Dr. Satyabrata Rout





















For further information please watch
a 10 mnts. video in youtube

Link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ENrwll_kx4

Friday, September 6, 2013


A Classic written by Indian Playwright Badal Sircar
Translation from Bengali to Hindi: Dr. Pratibha Agrawal
Scenography and Direction: Satyabrata Rout
Presented by Avartan Theatre, Hyderabad, India
_________________________________________________________________

To watch the play click on the link below:

EVAM INDRAJIT-Clip-1

EVAM INDRAJIT- Clip-2


AAvartan Theatre Ensamble


Theatre, being a collaborative medium of art, needs certain amount of dedication and commitment. Avartan, is an amalgamation artistes, intellectuals, scholars and teachers from various discipline of study, with definite objectives to reach to the diversified cultures, people and communities. Most of our members are from academic community of University of Hyderabad which includes students, academocians and practitioners.While working in an academic environment, we realized the need to break the elitist tag, often labeled on the performing arts, particularly in theatre. The group has tried to break-through the conventions of theatre pedagogy, in order to reach to the common mass, to make him/ her aware of his/her responsibility in today’s society. Understanding the fact that our time and society is being reflected directly through this art, we formed the group with a definite sense of commitment. Our group aims to achieve professionalism, perfection and to break the dogmas of conventions, that drags our society towards conservatism, an obstacle to progress in all sense.



Synopsis 

Evam Indrajit speaks of our contemporary world; youth in particular. Today, where everything has become materialistic, the youth, is losing its focus and drifting towards the less important in life. Consequently, the human in us is being replaced by machine, and life becomes a mere existence. This machine- like existence acts as an octopus, that is spreading its tentacles everywhere, creeping up the humanity; the reason why we lose our existence, identity and emotions. Indrajeet tries to seek the answers to these fundamental questions: “Who am I?”, “What am I?” and “Why am I?” The protagonist wants to break the walls of fundamentalism, and tries to establish an idealistic society, that can liberate us from the shackles of age-long customs and laws.


Written in the early seventies,  “…Evam Indrajit” is regarded as the first Indian absurd drama, which follows the principles of existentialism, a trend set by the ideas of western philosophers and authors like Albert Camus, Samuel Beckett, and Jean Paul Sartre. The meaninglessness of life somehow reflects in the total production and questions our whole existence of life. To make the play relevant to the contemporary global times,, we have taken the liberty to change, alter and redefine the struction of this unique creation without distorting the central idea of the author. The treatment of the production is humerous, satirical, caricaturist and at the same time absurd.


The Playwright

Badal Sircar is one of the leading contemporary Indian playwrights, known for creating myth out of the common social characters and ordinary life situations. The conventional boundaries between the actors and the audience are deliberately broken from time to time in his plays. The logistic concept of time and space is jumbled up to create an aura of absurdity of life, as seen in most of his plays, viz. …Evam Indrajeet, Pagla Ghoda, Saari Raat, Ant Nahin, Julus, Bhoma and Basi Khabar etc. Apart from being a playwright, he is also a known poet, thinker who has significantly contributed to Bengali literature. A town planning engineer by profession, Badal Sircar developed a passion to understand various aspects of theatre, particularly in performance studies and became a student of Zerji Grotowski, the legendary theatre philosopher of Poland. Inspired by the vision of Grotowski, he authored his first conceptual book “The Third Theatre”. The book throws lights on contemporary Indian drama and its presentation, living behind conventional and folk theatre. All his writings follow his own philosophy of life and thoughts, which starts with his play “…Evam Indrajeet”.



The Director

Satyabrata Rout is a known name in the contemporary Indian theatre scenario. A graduate from the National School of Drama with specialization in Design and Direction (1983), he worked as a Technical Director with Bharat Bhawan, Bhopal, for five years and then returned to NSD where he was associated in different capacities, first with the Theatre-in-Education project, then as a resource person for extension programme; and finally as lecturer in lighting. He joined as an Associate Professor in Design, at the University of Hyderabad in the year 2007. Having a wide range of work experience with eminent personalities and directors from India and abroad, his production bear his individual testimony and personal imprint. As a contemporary Designer and Director, Rout, has done rigorous research and also practiced the traditional form of Orissa, “Chhau” which reflects in his productions, “Passa”, “Rashomon”, “Urubhangam”, “Nagamandal”, HayaVadan”, “A Midsummer Nights’ Dream”, “Karna Katha”, etc. He has a long association with the legendary theatre philosopher, Sri B.V Karanth and has done his Ph.D on the thoughts and concept of B.V Karanth. A recipient of several fellowships and awards, he has been conferred with Manoher Singh Smriti Samman for his contribution to modern theatre movement, by the Government of India in 2006. Sri Rout is a visiting Professor to many foreign Universities and institution, such as International School of Bio-drama, Bogota Colombia and East 15 Acting School, University of Essex, UK, etc.























Cast

Indrajeet:   Ashish Shukla
Mansi:       Kiran Khoje
Amal:        Avdhesh Jha
Bimal:       Vasudev V. A
Kamal:      Mathew Sinu
Writer:       Satyabrata Rout  
Mausi/
Boss:        Kavita Abichandani
Patni /
Mansi-2:   Astha Mishra


Credit

Set and Props:               
Vasudev VA, Methew
Costume                      
Avadhesh Jha, Astha Mishra
Music                          
Krishna Soni
Light Design:                
Raghav Prakash Mishra
Assistant Designer:                      
Smruti Ranjan Biswal/ 
Rajanish Sharma
Stage Manager:
Rajeshwar B
Assistant Director/Prod. Controller:           
Krishna Soni

     

    Original Bengali Play by:  
Badal Sircar

Hindi translation
 Dr Pratibha Agrawal

Advisor
Mrs.Mitanjali Rout

The play is devised and directed by:
Satyabrata Rout
Associate Professor Theatre Arts, University of Hyderabad
____________________________________________