Swapnasandhani completed 32 years in theatre this year. Though they skipped the staging of a play this year, marking its birth anniversary, their popular production Hamlet is all set for its next show at the Academy of Fine Arts tomorrow. The play not only received appreciatiom from the theatre lovers of the city, but received accolades after its performances abroad too. Ahead of its 25th show, Swapnasandhani founder members Koushik Sen and Reshmi Sen, and Riddhi who portrays the character of Hamlet, talk to t2 about theatre in the city, Hamlet’s popularity and Swapnasandhani’s next production:

Swapnasandhani turned 32 this year. Has the task of carrying forward the legacy become easier or difficult with every passing day?

Koushik Sen: Whatever we are doing, we are continuing it out of our creative satisfaction. But it has definitely become more difficult with every passing day. With every passing day, we are realising that continuing the art of theatre in third world countries like ours is becoming difficult.
Reshmi: We have completed 32 years but when we started out with this group we were quite young. Soumitra Chatterjee was our first president and my father-in-law, Shyamal Sen, was our joint secretary. After his demise, Chitra Sen, my mother-in-law, became our secretary. We got that love and liberty from them as our elders but we worked very hard to build this group and we never imagined that we would complete 32 years. We used to hear that big groups are completing so many years but we never thought that we would do it too. We have been trying to adapt to various ways to take this group forward, but now, doing theatre is becoming even more difficult. It wasn’t easier earlier also because theatre is a minority art. Since it is not a populist art, we have always struggled. We are lucky that Swapnasandhani could create its own audience. Mostly, after we stage the first show of a new production, the first 10 shows become full house. The credit for that goes to our joint effort and our director’s thoughts. But it was not an easy journey like it is not for any other theatre group. We are lucky that we could complete so many years successfully.

Riddhi, there’s always an expectation out of such a legacy. Is that a pressure for you?

I don’t have a clear answer to that. Somehow, in my formative years, it was a natural phenomenon for me. The first 10 years of my childhood, I did not see Swapnasandhani as a different entity from my family because it was my extended family. I was never really affiliated with my relatives nor was I close to my school friends. All I had were them— the people of Swapnasandhani. It is all about what the exposure is and the way my parents have exposed me to theatre…more than the burden or the success, I understood it takes a lot to run a group and not just about staging a play but the infrastructural problem. Now, the awareness has increased, we can reach out to different people with different requests but when my parents started out, it was not like this. There’s a very strong history of theatre or the culture of theatre in Calcutta. The kind of commitment they showed… my mother sold off her jewellery in order to fund a play. That kind of dedication… which is not just about an intellectual exercise but so much sacrifice from one’s daily life... I don’t think I will be able to. Theatre is a way of life… which these people have done. I am afraid our generation won’t be able to do this. It is not our fault but an infrastructural fault.

Koushik: When Reshmi was selling her jewellery, Rajatava (Dutta) and Kanchan (Mullick) also did a lot. I have seen my father and his friends do it in this manner. But at that time, theatre was also seen from a perspective of such romanticism. Rudraprasad Sengupta, Arun Mukherjee, Ashok Mukherjee, my parents — they all did theatre like this. But this can’t be expected from Riddhi’s generation.
Reshmi: We can’t blame these children or expect them to do what we did in our times. The way we neglected our career and gave it to theatre... we can’t tell children nowadays that you must come and practise regularly. They are all working, they are working from home, sometimes online and sometimes offline. How can we expect from them that they will come on every rehearsal date or show date? We try to adjust the show date in a way so that everyone can come. Otherwise, the show won’t happen! But doing rehearsal is also important. But we are no longer that strict about rehearsal dates. We can’t expect that time from them, then how will they earn their living?
Koushik: There’s no solution to this. Right now, I have a few members in the group who would do theatre 24 hours if they would get the chance. They are interested.
Riddhi: But I do see a silver lining in this. I think we are going through an event saturation in the digital world and I think we are going to flourish more in the next 10 years in the live performance segment.
Reshmi: After Covid, we saw this a bit. Though a few populist Hindi films were released, people were flocking to theatres as during the two years they couldn’t see anything live. That urge to see things live became very strong.
Riddhi: AI will come and change acting in some way. We will be dependent on it. But how will theatre or live performance use it? There’s no space for AI in that other than the technical aspects like sound or light.

What is the approach of the younger generation of actors towards theatre?

Koushik: We have to create a strategy to involve them. All theater directors across the nation are having to do this jugglery to involve them. Students who have passed out from NSD (National School of Drama) are going from door to door of filmmakers because we couldn’t build that repertoire in theatre. Like in London, you can see a catalogue of what you want to watch. They want us to know their people and culture through theatre. But that pride has not been built around theatre in our country. It is all about cinema.
Riddhi: There, a theatre ticket is more expensive than a film ticket. We can understand from that.
Reshmi: There, very renowned actors are still associated with theatre. Al Pacino is still doing theatre. He is doing King Lear now. What is the need for him to do theatre now? What will be get from theatre now?
Riddhi: Al Pacino has been doing it for many years but many young commercial actors are still doing it. Tom Holland is doing Spider Man on screen and is doing Romeo Juliet in theatre.
Reshmi: There are two reasons for this. Many of their actors went to do films from theatre and then came back to theatre and they get the economic support from theatre as well. If Al Pacino feels he will not do films for a year, whatever he will earn from theatre, he can sustain for a year. But our governments or private sponsors have never thought of sustaining theatre with their financial support in this manner. I can speak about myself, if I could make my family run by doing theatre, I would never do serial or films. I am first a theatre actor and then I have joined the industry. If we could give this support to theatre actors then they could rehearse more methodically as they could afford to give that time to theatre. We all balance all our work and take out time for theatre and work for two-three months to do a new play. From morning, we will prepare our body, our voice, practise dance and song, practise body movement and along with it practise acting. If we could do this or if people could think that we could take theatre to this level, then perhaps we could also become equally successful. Many youngsters want to do it. They are not able to because of their jobs. We don’t have strict norms. We have no membership. No strict rules and regulations. We try in every way to support the youngsters. When we were abroad, Riddhi had arranged that a dancer would correct their body movement and a singer would help their voices. There’s a space to learn in Swapnasandhani. A space to learn acting from basics. We wish we could help them financially, too.
Riddhi: The problems are layered. We have always politicised theatre. We have to make people understand, specially in West Bengal, that it is not a lesser art form. People from our own community and from the film community… we have given a perspective that it is a lesser art form. In films, we can get 12 shows in a day but in theatre, one show a day. That is not helping us to reach the mass audience as much as we are aspiring. The seating in the halls is unscientific. There is no bar on the stage. Our actors take life risks often to get the background creatives.
Reshmi: There is a lack of parking as well as a proper place to relax post show or sit for a coffee and chat…like Prithvi has.
Koushik: A friend of mine told me something once. I felt angry at that time but now I understand. This word ‘theatre worker’...why ‘worker’? He had asked this question. With group theatre there has been an association of the IPTA movement’s history, so theatre is a movement, a political struggle, it is a worker…but his is a part of it. Nobody is denying that. But it is also an art form. Somewhere in the theatre culture of Bengal, the idea of theatre worker prevails and so you have to struggle. So, you will not get to eat if you do theatre. This concept that was built within us for a long time hindered our progress.
Riddhi: When you believe in an ideology, it is great. But when you sell that ideology in the name of ideology that is very problematic. In most cases, it is said that one is doing theatre for an ideology and not professionally, but in most cases, these ideologies are very corrupt and very much packaged and sold as ideologies.

Koushik: Whenever we are discussing anything about Utpal Dutt, we talk about his political thoughts. He used to say that he is a propagandist and Marxist. But those of us who saw Utpal Dutt’s production, we know it is not just that. He is a director of an international level. Before his political stand, the spectacle of his plays were absolutely captivating. The discussion of his political ideology comes first. We are all dodging our creative responsibility in the name of political theatre. We are not doing any culture on our shortcomings and keeping ourselves behind a facade of doing a political play. The craft is very bad but we kept a message! Utpal Dutt’s craft was at an international level.

Swapnasandhani skipped its festival this year…

Koushik: Swapnasandhani has never done something thinking they have to do it. We want to do theatre in a way where people can relate it with the time they are living in. Be it Macbeth or Hamlet, people watched and understood that we were not presenting something that Shakespeare said 400 years ago. People could understand that we are talking about the present time as well. Our next production is Mahasweta Devi’s Hajar Churashir Maa. We didn’t hurry it because we knew we were not prepared to stage it. We are doing it with a lot of planning.

Riddhi: We are not untrained actors. We could easily do it for its political relevance. But that is what we are saying that at the end of the day this is a craft. People are coming to watch us by paying to get engaged. We have to essentially practise a craft. With each play, there is a process where we have to unlearn and do it in a completely different way.

You also spoke on social media about the funding problem. But despite Hamlet proving that private funding can be profit inducing, why is it not a common thing in theatre?

Riddhi: There are about 200 to 300 theatre groups in Calcutta at present and the theatre grant from the central government has stopped…

Reshmi: Those who are getting the grant, they have to do a propagandist act to get it. It is not coming for free to anyone. But this is not right as it is the government’s job to support different forms of art and artistes.

Riddhi: Private fundings are exceptions. We have a reputation but what if there’s a new group that has no reputation and no great list of actors… Will a private company fund them? No. We are from that exceptional category and we are lucky. We have earned that privilege out of our hard work. Not a reputation earned out of doing odd jobs. But there are a lot of talented people who have no funding and we don’t have an answer to this. Until and unless the whole theatre community comes together and they stop their complacency, we can’t find a solution to this. It is always the people within the institution who pull down the institution. It is a historic case. The past, the previous past, they have to put aside their ego. They are great artistes but a section of them are extremely complacent and selfish. They are not thinking about the future. They are only thinking about how to just hold their own places till they are there. Everyone has to come together. It has to be a collective approach.

Hajar Churashir Maa will see a collaboration with a cinematographer…

Koushik: Those who have worked with me on stage with lighting are all great people. This time I felt that since Soumik Halder is a great cinematographer… they have told me many times, like I once spoke to Sirsha. Avik told me once. They all wanted to explore theatre. While talking to Soumik, he expressed his interest and we are doing a play based on the Naxal period and we are doing it in 2024 or ’25. So, I was curious to see how a cinematographer who works in a completely different medium explores with the light. We are watching proscenium throughout but the view of proscenium can change through set designing, directorial composition and the light. Theatre is an art of collaboration. As a 55-year-old, I have learnt and seen light in a way. If someone can teach me to see it in a new way, what can be better? So, we are collaborating with Soumik. With Hajar Churashir Maa we are also trying to explore spaces. We are looking forward to it. It is not there. We have to build it.

Riddhi: When I go to watch theater at Academy (of Fine Arts), I know how inconvenient it is. Parking is far away. Infrastructure is the real problem. Salute to the audience who are still coming to watch our plays.

Tell us about your participation in Columbus’s 10th South Asian theatre festival, where Hamlet was staged…

Reshmi: We collaborated with Spotlight , a team from Columbus, and performed with them. Usually, we collaborate with light and sound there. Earlier, we could take many people from the team but now they can’t afford that. They wanted to collaborate with us. We had a rigorous rehearsal process. The people we collaborated with are actors who do theatre there regularly. They travelled with us to Michigan and Chicago, too.

Riddhi: Our two takeaways from there are… firstly, the NRI there still have their love for theatre. They have their day jobs, too, which is difficult… to adjust to that kind of a scenario. It is a demanding life. They do everything on their own. Despite that, their hunger for collaborative theatre is a very beautiful thing. Secondly, we understood that more than the digital platform their attraction for live performance was tremendous.

Koushik: We staged it after 9.30pm but there were over 1,200 people. From different performances people came, stood and watched.

How do the Bengalis there perceive theatre in Bengal now?

Riddhi: I think what people really admire and they were marvelled by the fact that Calcutta theatre is contemporary. They have a huge infrastructure there and financial support. They can’t always travel and see what we are doing here. So, they were surprised how contemporary we are. Calcutta is not lagging behind. At times we are ahead. The audience were marvelled with this. It is Shakespeare’s infinite greatness that we can reinterpret his plays with time. And it was very interestingly interpreted. We did a different version of Hamlet there where we ended the play with Ophelia, keeping the Palestinian and Ukraine conflict in the backdrop. So, Ophelia became the central character of the play. It penetrated the audience. Not only the contemporary interpretation but also the craft is very contemporary. They felt they are missing out.

Koushik: It was very hard for them to rehearse. They have to take a lot of responsibility there. But they are very energetic and eager to learn, and had no ego. People of different ages came together

Riddhi, your portrayal of Hamlet has been so popular. You will be staging it for the 25th time tomorrow at the Academy of Fine Arts. What is it about the play that people are watching it over and over again?

Riddhi: For any Shakespeare’s play, the first 15 shows you don’t achieve anything. I think people were paying to watch the rehearsals. After the 15th or 16th show, I can say I have merely scratched the surface of the character. Great actors like Ian McKellen have played such characters five or six times. I have achieved nothing!

Koushik: There is a different side to this also. When Sir John Geilgud did Hamlet for the fourth time, Peter Brook did not like it at all because by that time Sir John Geilgud had understood Hamlet so much that the spontaneity of action was not there. Every line was too defined.

Riddhi: Now, I am really enjoying the character the most. I’m in this phase. The pressure of doing it for the first time is not there… It is also a speciality of Swapnasandhani. Our audience know that we don’t do repeat shows. We have have audience who watched the same show seven or eight times also. They told us that everytime they watched something new. It is the lineage of the group. This is our process

Reshmi: Koushik cannot direct in one way. He keeps changing direction. In 23 shows, 23 changes are there!

Riddhi: And the credit goes to William Shakespeare. It is the character’s charm. You really would like to watch it again and again. It is really a character versus a play. It is a universal crisis. Every person has a crisis within regarding ‘to be or not to be’.

Riddhi, one legend who is a huge inspiration for you is Naseeruddin Shah…what is that one thing you learnt about theatre from him?

Riddhi: It is our privilege that our family has formed a good bond with him. My parents are huge admirers. After their marriage, they used to go to bed with Naseeruddin Shah’s picture placed above their head!

Koushik: He is the last word in acting for me. Ratnaji told me it is a disease!

Reshmi: I am a fan of Ratnaji more than Naseerji.

Riddhi: He is one of the most beautiful human beings. He is such a truthful human being and so he is such a great actor. After watching Nagarkirtan, he had only suggested to my father to do Hamlet. He told him: “You have the cast at home.” He literally came to Calcutta to inaugurate the play and it was our 30th year celebration. He sat in the fourth row. He did not want to sit in the first row. He knows it can be watched best from there. It was a house-full show. I could make out in Academy that he is sitting there…ethereal…with his white beard. It was a bad stress! The way he approached a young actor and the way he suggested…that is so inspiring. No sense of ego or hierarchy. That gives us a sense that a person loves his craft.