A mismatched couple in a city is facing an existential crisis after the government has enacted a new law. In a far-flung village, a mob wants to kill a narcissistic grandfather. The people of a mountain village talk in whispers through the year fearing their words would trigger an avalanche. At the Mahindra Excellence in Theatre Awards (Meta) this year, mismatched couples, fearsome mobs and frightened villagers form protagonists of plays, many of which paint a dystopian future of a society in the grip of fear and control.
Part of ten new productions shortlisted for Meta, plays like Ghanta Ghanta Ghanta Ghanta Ghanta by Marathi theatre company Aasakta Kalamanch, Bhoothangal by Kerala’s Athlete Kayika Nadakavedhi and the newly-launched Mumbai theatre company. The Gathered’s debut play, Avalanche, represent India’s changing theatre landscape where new experiments with aesthetics and language are allowing playwrights to explore deep divisions and doubts in a global society reeling from populism and authoritarianism.
“We are finding authoritarian governments everywhere across the world today and people are facing different kinds of imposition of rules,” says Mohit Takalkar, director of Marathi play Ghanta Ghanta Ghanta Ghanta Ghanta, which tells the story of a mismatched couple whose life is suddenly thrown into disarray after the government enacts a new law forbidding citizens from speaking more than 140 words per day. Insecure musician Aaditya and careerist lawyer Feroza are Takalkar’s protagonists who are forced to navigate the new world of fear and control. Set in the future described only as tomorrow, the 100-minute play which premiered in Pune last year, has received six Meta nominations, including Best Director, Best Production, Best Actor in a Lead Role, both female and male.
“We need to stand up and say what we want to. We dare to say what we want to strongly enough,” says Takalkar, who directed Hunkaro, a Marwadi/ Hindi/ Awadhi/ Haryanvi play by the Ujaagar Dramatic Association in Jaipur, Rajasthan, which handled the hardships faced by migrant workers during the pandemic with a minimalist set and folk songs by the Manganiyars. Ghanta Ghanta Ghanta Ghanta Ghanta, which was part of the International Theatre Festival of Kerala last month like Hunkaro, has popular Marathi actor Lalit Prabhakar in the lead along with Mallika Singh Hanspal, a non-Marathi speaking actor. “I wanted that contrast in language,” explains Takalkar about casting Hanspal.
Malayalam play Bhoothangal, which has won five nominations, including Best Production and Best Director for the Palakkad-based Athlete Kayika Nadakavedhi’s O T Shajahan, probes patriarchy through the eyes of an eight-year-old boy, a witness to his grandfather’s brutal authority and cruelty. “The play deals with the question of how social challenges impact a child and therefore the future generations,” says Aliyar Ali, nominated for Best Stage Design. Based on a 2022 Malayalam film, Appan, the play, which premiered in Dubai last month, shows a family and village burdened by an authoritarian patriarch. Matters come to a head when a mob assembles to murder the narcissistic grandfather.
Hindustani play Avalanche directed by Gandharv Dewan, nominated in six categories including Best Production and Best Director, gathers an ensemble cast of Shardul Bhardwaj, Swaroopa Ghosh, Vikram Kochhar, Anamika Tiwari and Lakshya Goel to explore a mountain village’s vicissitudes of existence when fear of an avalanche forces residents to speak in whispers. Translated from the Turkish play of the same title by Tuncer Cücenoglu, by Dewan, Bhardwaj and Rajesh Nirmal, Avalanche is The Gathered’s debut production commissioned by the Serendipity Arts Festival last year. “The play was translated into Hindustani from an English translation of the original Turkish play. It resonates with our times and challenges us artistically,” says Dewan, a graduate of the National School of Drama, Delhi, who acted in the Netflix series The Railway Men on the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy.
Other nominees for the Mahindra Excellence in Theatre Awards this year are Mumbai-based Tamboo Theatre Company’s Gagan Damama Bajyo (Hindi) directed by Piyush Mishra, Nagaon-based Rangamancha’s Raghunath (Assamese) directed by Bidyut KR Nath, TAAM Manipur’s Agni Suta Draupadi (Hindi) directed by Maisnam Joy Metei, Mumbai-based 72° East Productions Siachen (Hindi) directed by Makarand Deshpande, Kolkata-based Chetna’s Gopal Ure & Co. (Bengali) directed by Sujan Mukhopadhyay, Do You Know This Song? (Hindi/English) produced and directed by Mallika Taneja, and Bengaluru-based Bhoomija’s Girish Karnad-authored Hayavadana (Hindi). The Meta jury this year include actor-writer Dolly Thakore, actor Kulbhushan Kharbanda, actor-director Kusum Haider, playwright Mahesh Dattani and actor Vinay Pathak.
