Dristipat Theatre Fest
Konjush, Kongkal staged on second day
Two invited theatre troupes — Loko Natyadal (Siddheswary) and Natyateertha — staged plays on the second day of the ongoing six-day Dristipat Theatre Festival on Monday at the theatre halls of Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy. Dristipat Natyadal has organised the festival to celebrate its 30th founding anniversary. Loko Natyadal (Siddheswary) staged its most acclaimed play Konjush at National Theatre Hall, while Natyateertha staged its latest production Kongkal at Experimental Theatre Hall in the evening.
Loko Natyadal’s Konjush is an adaptation of French playwright Moliere’s The Miser. Popular actor-director Tarik Anam Khan has adapted the play and Liaquat Ali Lucky has directed it.
Tarik Anam’s adaptation contexualises and transforms the miser (Harpagon) in Moliere’s play into one Haider Ali who seems to be a familiar figure to the local audience. Moreover, use of old Dakhaiya dialect makes the play an iconic comedy.
The play, which possesses the record of having maximum shows, over 650 shows, still takes the audience into fits of laughter.
The other play, Kongkal (Skeleton), is a tragedy taking the audience into some old questions of values and morals. The play is an adaptation of Rabindranatha Tagore’s homonymous short story.
Adapted by Rabiul Islam and directed by Tapan Hafiz, the play poses questions to society’s stance against love and remarriage of widows.
The story of Kongkal (Skeleton) revolves around an uncanny conversation between a man (named Khoka Babu in the play) and a girl’s apparition (named Kanak in the play).
It is the apparition who, in flashback, tells her life’s story – how she ended up being a skeleton for the study of osteology, how and why she, early-married and early-widowed, fell in love and poisoned herself.
Today, Indian troupe Kalyani Kolamondalam and local troupe Nagarik Natya Sampraday will stage Manushi and Opekkhaman respectively at National and Experimental Theatre Halls.
-With New Age input
