Exploring theatre through children

Theatre is only one aspect of what I want to do with children,” shares Shaili Sathyu, daughter of a film and theatre director MS Sathyu, who is on a mission to expose threatre to children by staging plays and conducting workshops.

Director and founder of ‘Gillo Theatre Repertory,’ Shaili, is involved in theatre-making, which she picked up from her parents. Her mother Shama Zaidi is a screenwriter. ‘Gillo’ features the play ‘Chidiya,Udd!’ directed by Shaili Sathyu in Hyderabad for the first time in association with Hyderabad Children’s Theatre Festival.

Excerpts:
Tell us about you being inspired by your parents?
In overall scheme of things, I can say yes, but the kind of work that I am doing now is nothing compared to the work they have done but is the basic about theatre and the love of the craft that I guess has come from my parents.

Tell us about your journey in theatre?
In my school and college days, I worked as a co-ordinator for the Mumbai IPTA chapter. I used to do stage design and costume design and then I moved on to write. I got interested in writing for children and that’s when I decided to bring together my skills to write for the children. I love theatre, I was more into the production side than acting.

What was challenging when you started theatre company?
Initially, I wanted to have a theatre company that works only on making plays for children and not adults. This was a big challenge. So, that was something difficult for people who joined in as actors. It was difficult for them to adjust as they were many artistes who did not want to work in children’s play. In the beginning it was challenging to convince the actors. Some stuck with us for a quite long time, which was encouraging.

The other challenge for me was to get educators and parents on board and make them understand the habit of watching a play which is not common in India, but now they have an understanding and is a part of NCRT arts curriculum where state of viewing is an art of aesthetic development. Tell us about travelling all around the country. We just finish performing in Bengaluru and now we are in Hyderabad then we are going to Vizag and Ahmedabad.

What can Hyderabad expect from ‘Chidiya,Udd!’?
‘Chidiya,Udd!’ is a various moments in a child and a little birds life about how they meet and become friends and play together. They are a lot of materials used to make the play interesting like flowers, sea etc. A lot of body movement has been choreographed which makes children curious. This is the first time Hyderabad witnessed a play for children between 1 and 4 years. For above 5 years, we don’t provide because the narrative becomes different. Toddler theatres are very few and it is a new thing in India.

Directing and conducting workshop how is it different for you?
Workshops bring out the creativity of children who are above five years. Our work is these kids gets us connected with them intellectually. We share with them the joy of art. They absorb many things from the art.

We have to move from the mindset that we need to teach children because in the workshop we train kids to think about something so that their imagination gets triggered. This also rejuvenates their ideas. We should look at how art can be a medium to express, share, think and imagine and going more into fundamentals. And most importantly we get to respect children as individuals.

My philosophy is that we need not have to teach children. But open window for them they are capable of doing wonders. As adults we need to be sure that we include their ideas and encourage them. We need to respect individual perspective of these children.

What is your relationship with Hyderabad?
In 2010 and 2015, we performed at the Hyderabad children theatre festival. We had a wonderful experience in Hyderabad on these two occasions. We would like to come to Hyderabad every year, this time in Hyderabad has been a great experience. I think the relationship will grow from here.