Good times for theatre

Plenty of action to look forward, in July and August

The next two months, July and August promise a lot of eventful activities for theatre professionals of city, who are now seeing an upsurge in audience support and increased variety in their presentations propelled by new theatre groups in the city.

Saptadha- the seven week festival of Rangadhara comprising Telugu, Hindi and Marathi plays which began on June 1 and will go on till July 12 at various locations across the city has already taken the city audience by storm.

The next in the queue are two other developments – the golden jubilee of the Dramatic Circle of Hyderabad (DCH) in August and the bon voyage to America for the much acclaimed – Main Rahi Masoom – a monologue by noted stage exponent Vinay Varma and staged more than 30 times in the past few years all over India.

‘This is on invitation from Aligarh Association based there’ informed a delighted Bhaskar Shewalkar, a veteran and renowned theatre professional of Rangadhara, who also pointed out that it was the only play selected from Hyderabad to be performed at the National School of Drama competition held at New Delhi a few years ago.

The Dramatic Circle of Hyderabad has already initiated its celebrations over the past few months when they staged a monologue of noted theatre legend Vithal Rajan titled ‘Karl Marx in Hyderabad’. More events are in the pipeline for sure, said a veteran theatre watcher who has been associated with DCH.

If quantity is no more an issue, quality surely is, say old timers who have mixed opinions about the crowd that throngs popular venues like Lamakaan and Our Sacred Space. ‘It somehow makes me feel that it is a licence for some offensive and gross live shows to be performed’ felt a viewer who is a regular at both these venues. Recently, one such play, aimed at ‘light humour’ of the Dakhani variety went overboard and had to be pulled out before it staged its second show in succession, informed the concerned viewer.

“Access to public support and welcome is one thing, adhering to minimum quality,” said another playwright, who is associated with curating such activities at one of the leading locations of the city. “Sometimes, bawdy, double entendres pass off for comedy,” he admits.

Hyderabad playwrights, as local veterans inform, can take a leaf out of the best practices prevalent at other locations like neighbouring Bengaluru where the leading centres often insist on vetting the script first before giving approval for staging the play. It is not strictly followed in our city is an open secret as many poorly enacted plays fall through the cracks and end up torturing the hapless viewers.

With such a long standing and illustrious theatre culture in the city, it is time to spruce up and improve with the times - surely an object lesson.