Myriad shades of student theatre

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In a tour de force of student theatre presented as a part of the Asia Pacific Bureau Drama School’s Meet, theatregoers, faculty, students and guests were treated to a dizzying array of theatre styles, substance, symbolism and superb acting. With the enthusiasm brought to this dramaturgic collective by students from China, Hong Kong,

Iran, India, New Zealand, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan and the Philippines, many great performances were shared, ideas exchanged, and opportunities for future collaboration and creative development were discussed.
The workshop performances were each followed by an interface with the audience which led to animated exchanges of views and highlighted the special attitude of the performers to their creative enterprise. The idea was not to see a complete production but to witness the process, to see the work in progress, to decipher the likenesses and dissimilarities that mark theatre in the region.
The Toi Whakaari Drama School of New Zealand is considered the foremost dramatic arts training facility for the past 40 years. What lends power to their work is that the Toi Whakaari Drama School encourages collaboration among disciplines exploring innovations through the Maori framework indigenous to New Zealand. The Maori influence was evident in the welcome song sung as the audience was led into the performing space and the final gratitude song sung by the students.
Working together for the last one year or so, the three students — Leon Wadham, Hilary Sproull and Chris Parker — are so integrated with each other that when they spoke after the performance each picked up from the other in a seamless flow. This reiterated the high level of communication between seen during the performance. Adopting the space is the first step and this did not present any problem in the dynamic Bahumanch, NSD’s all-purpose hall. Their performance was energetic, fluid, and able to fill the entire space with evocative movements that reflected their engagement with Indian sensibility as contained in the Panchatantra.
The five inspirational principles primarily revolve around friendship, truth and the need to stay vigilant against betrayals of and by friends as related in the Panchatantra as seen by the modern mind. As Chris put it: “We are not telling the stories, nor are we going into each principle in its dogmatic sense what we are trying to do is to give an idea of the Panchatantra, a perfume of its principles.”
The scent was all pervasive in the vignettes of theatre dynamics that had elements of mime, clown, and Commedia dell’ Arte combined in a distinct meld of contemporary experience with sketch comedy.
Strongly autobiographical in nature there were amazing confessions very matter-of-factly delivered in a staccato voice: “I pooped in the bath” says Leon; “I have a boyfriend. We like to spend the whole day. In bed,” says Haley. Chris has one boob and is teased for it. He confesses to seeing male a Maori with big boobs and “I joined the others in their laughter of ridicule.” Honesty and integrity shine through the performance. It was theatre of truth and commitment done with style and excellence.
The Tehran University’s drama department presentation of a solo show titled Mysterious Gift was a surprise package in every which way. Firstly, the performer was a world acclaimed actor, Yasser Khaseb whose work on non-verbal physical theatre has been widely appreciated at several theatre festivals. But secondly and most importantly the show was a startling experience. Born in a family of traditional actors, Yasser started learning the art at the age of 10. He has added a great deal to his forefathers’ art by practising the craft as a youngster when he would imitate animals and their movements to make his body more flexible.
And what a body Yasser has. It is as if it were boneless in the contortions he can make it perform. The 25-minute show, written, directed and performed by Yasser, is a journey from birth to death with the accompanying struggle for existence, communication, and final ascension. His contorted body, face covered by black cloth, gives impressions of animal heads and bodies. Slowly, the human body is seen as a foetus in a red pool of light. The red spot gives way to an expanded yellow spot light as the foetus expands and begins kicking its legs and arms. The rising from baby to adult was a precarious tripping of legs and arms as the child becomes a man.
Then followed a miraculous descent of a red bundle from the air. Slowly, Yasser pulls out a red figure which seems alive. The two figures play together, the games become more violent as they hit, slap, smack and try to strangle each other. Finally, the small figure succeeds in sending Yasser to his death. He hangs there suspended by one leg and the smaller figure takes a bow. The lights come on to reveal the young figure as a puppet miraculously manipulated by Yasser. It is indeed a thrilling moment as the master shows how the puppet is attached to his body and the hand hitting him is his own, clad in a white glove as opposed his other black gloved hand.
Following the deafening applause, the numerous questions during the interaction session were related to the interpretation of the performance. Yasser was speaking through an interpreter who had her own story to tell of how since Yasser was travelling abroad a great deal, the department decided to give him an English tutor. However, after a few days the teacher returned saying that Yasser did not need any language to communicate, his body was sufficient. The answer Yasser gave to the question of interpretation was that he wanted each one to draw his/her own meaning. Furthermore, he added that each culture had its own interpretation. When asked about the political intent of the work, he replied he was not political and worked on the humane level.
Was he not affected by the social and economic situation in Iran? I asked. He said he as a person was naturally affected by what was happening in the country, but did not let it affect his creative process. This did not sound too sound a reply, especially considering the work itself had several political undertones in the violence it depicted. However, one cannot deny the miraculous nature of Yasser’s art. He is truly marvellous.
The second year students of the National Academy of Performing Arts, Beijing, gave colourful display of the opera form in Chinese culture. The Beijing Opera was represented by the Celestial Beauty, written by the great female impersonator Mei Lanfang (1894-1961) who left the stage during the Japanese occupation and grew a moustache as a protest against repression. In spite of economic difficulties during the war, he refused the enticing offers to perform made by the Japanese. A few days after the end of the war at the age of 51, he was back on stage.
This performance of the Celestial Beauty was by female artist and lacked the edge that a male artist i.e. a female impersonator could have brought to it. The Shanxi Opera was represented by a Wen-style play The Simple Banquet where the male impersonator was seen in action. The elegant and gracious movements of the character and the ability to control the feathered horns of the head dress were brilliantly displayed. The Henan Opera repertoire offered Chou or comic characters in play in the Sedan Lift Chair where a bride is carried in a sedan chair by four men who entertain themselves and the bride on the journey. The Chinese performance was a structured one of ready-made plays done by students who have been training from the ages of 12 years.
The NSD show titled Silence of Desdemona was in fact the play Othello adapted in Hindustani in the folk tradition of Uttar Pradesh Nautanki by Tripurari Sharma who evolved the play in a folk performance workshop with the second year students of the NSD. Except for a song at the beginning of the play sung by Emilia, Desdemona’s maid, extolling the qualities of woman who is exemplified by Desdemona, there was little else to corroborate the title.
There were some good performances in the exercise, presented as part of the APB meet, but by and large the singing, so important a part of the musical form of Nautanki, was inadequate. Debashish Mondal playing Othello displayed excellent dramatic control, but did not do as well as Prakriti (Desdemona) did in the singing department, particularly in the death scene which was extraordinarily well-conceived and crafted. The other characters who performed well were Raju Roy (Iago) in acting and Hardik Shah as Desdemona’s father with his tuneful singing.