2 plays staged on last day
The four-day theatre festival organised by Padatik Natya Sangsad (TSC) ended in an ordinary manner on Monday at the Shilpakala Academy. There was no formal closing ceremony as done in any other festivals. Just two scheduled plays were staged at the two venues.
‘Due to hartal we had to cancel the closing ceremony,’ a theatre activist of the organising troupe said.The festival was organised marking the 90th birth anniversary of the late Syed Badruddin Hossain, who served the Padatik Natya Sangsad (TSC) as the president till his death.
Prangonemor staged historic play Awrongojeb at the National Theatre Hall while Dhaka Padatik staged Tagore’s short story based production Apod at the Experimental Theatre Hall.
Depicting a real life story of the Mughal emperor Awrongojeb, Indian playwright Mohit Chattopadhyaya’s drama Awrongojeb portrays ‘palace conspiracy’ and its aftermaths. The tragic hero of the play Awrongojeb, who arrived on the throne killing his siblings and taking his father Shajahan captive, also get the same treatment from his sons Azam and Kambux.
‘The production shows how the dearest bond may appear as the cruelest when the question of achieving absolute power comes. And we have tried to articulate the theme in the theatre,’ director Ananto Hira said.
A moderate number of audiences watched the show. ‘Theatre is not only for entertainment and the troupe has staged a timely production which gives a positive message about the contemporary Bangladesh, where the nation is captive in the hands of the greedy political leaders,’ Rafiq Rahman, an audience said.
‘It is a good play and I love the costumes, which give the realistic flavour of the historical events,’ Fakrul Islam, a student, said.
Not many audiences were also found at the Experimental Theatre Hall where Dhaka Padatik staged Apod, adapted and directed by Masum Aziz.
Apod, an adaptation of Rabindranath Tagore’s short story having the same title, narrates different human emotions in question of trust and mistrust in diverse human life through the story of Kiron, an ailing housewife who goes to change the air at their rural Bungalow. A stranger, Neelkanta, suddenly appears on a stormy night. After his arrival strange incidents start occurring.
‘The message of the play is as relevant as it was when Tagore wrote the short story in the early last century,’ director Masum Aziz told New Age.
Pabon Das, a regular audience, said, ‘This is for the second time I watched the play. All of them performed tremendously well.’
‘The play successfully articulates the message of the play,’ another audience Senjuti Rahman said.
-With New Age input
