Stage delight: Pedagogy at play

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JUGGLING IS sometimes called the art of controlling patterns in time and space. Theatre director Anuradha Kapur practices this magical form of art as she switches between the roles of a trainer, an artist, and an administrator who runs the National School of Drama, the premiere theatre training institute of India. She has played

double roles throughout her theatre career, without letting one overpower the other. As a director of the drama school, Kapur plans to provide best resources to students, and as a stage director and member of the theatre clan, she portrays determination against compromising creativity.
Kapur feels that the challenges facing the theatre community should not be left to themselves in the hope of evolutionary automatic solutions, and their solutions must be derived systematically. For instance, the basic problem of lack of resources must be addressed methodically and specific solutions must be found.
She holds inflated prices of auditoriums and lack of rehearsal spaces responsible for short-spans of productions in India. To counter these practical concerns of the theatre community, she is working on a proposal to convert old factories, defunct offices and halls into informal venues for practice and performances. “In India, it is close to impossible to keep a play alive for decades. The infrastructure to support rehearsals and shows is simply absent. The only answer lies in having many more rehearsal spaces and repertories of smaller sizes.”
She recalls the contribution of basement space of Sri Ram Centre, which was available on minimal cost, to flourishing of many Delhi-based debut groups till late ’80s. “At NSD, we can’t open our auditoriums to regular general use as we need to meet the requirements of our own students’ practical syllabus and repertory schedule. We must have spaces like Prithvi in Mumbai which are available round the year. It can provide opportunities to new artists and help in sustaining productions for longer duration. If we are able to develop a system of low-cost auditoriums, it will be a collective dream come true.’’
As a theatre teacher, Kapur stresses on the importance of good training and availability of resources. “Proper training is required to drive the passion. We must have more drama training centres with various opportunities. These centres should not be the duplication of the National School of Drama and provide variety in training. However, mushroom-growth must be avoided to maintain the quality of resources and meet the need of syllabus.”
Back in the ’60s, when Kapur chose stage as her career, her educationist dad offered a piece of advice: “You must have a degree to do the things you want to achieve.” Following this gurumantra, Kapur earned her Masters, followed by Doctorate in theatre from the University of Leeds, UK. Her foundation in theatre was laid down during her school days. Her interactions with Uma Sahay and Om Shiv Puri introduced her to the world of drama. She considers her performing years at Dishantar, a group started by Shivpuri and his wife Sudha in late ’60s, as the basic training ground. In her graduation years at Miranda House, Kapur was part of the group which activated Hindi language plays in the college campus. After returning from UK, she devised, conscripted and directed several street plays and slowly moved to interesting adaptations and texts. “Theatre trapped in particular areas does not help larger audiences. My years of nukkad plays belonged to the era of activist theatre. Many issues were being raised by street theatre. Om Swaaha, a play based on the dowry issue, had a long life beyond our performance. Though nukkad has some constraints, it is still the language of campus theatre. Experiments are being done and this form of drama has not lost its importance.”
She feels theatre is a hybrid form of art which can absorb all elements of human life. “The most interesting thing about theatre is its impurity. There is immense scope of experiment and creativity. It’s a mix bag of everything — dance, poetry, painting etc. As long as the soul of the text is safe, all kinds of mediums can be explored for putting together the best show,” says Kapur.
Most of her work has been in step with the concerns she had as a person. Topics such as female impersonation have found space in Kapur’s productions. “I have always tried to re-interpret the text and transform it in contemporary context. In my play Umrao, the attempt was to precipitate the character, condensed in the 19th century, in today’s world”.
She is also one of the founder-members of Vivadi, a working group of painters, musicians, writers and theatre practitioners, formed in 1989. Her publications include Actors, Pilgrims, Kings and Gods: The Ramlila at Ramnagar. Her plays have travelled extensively in India and abroad. In 2004, she received the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award for direction.
India, as a nation, has now become extremely thirsty, and its thirst is never quenched but with the best of developments. For the country, less than the best is no solution, and the same goes for its theatrescape. To be the director of the NSD is surely a challenging job in such high-performance environment and all eyes are set on Kapur’s manoeuvring of the theatrical chariot.