Inaugural song, agomoni dance, recitation… the Durga puja stage may have a number of miscellaneous shows but it doesn’t quite feel complete without drama.
Time was when actors spent months rehearsing lines, when directors would be hired from outside for the finishing touches, and when spectators would stream in from neighbouring blocks to watch the Navami-r natok.
While some of that sheen is lost today, old-timers cannot recall the golden days of theatre without a smile on their lips. The play, they say, was the item that anchored the puja functions.
Down memory lane
CF Block’s Barin Sarkar says back in the 80s and 90s, it was theatre that gave their block its identity. “Neighbours from other blocks would start asking months in advance which play we would be staging this time,” says the actor and director.
Those were the days when power cuts were as certain as sunset. “We would rehearse under lamps, candles, and inverters and on our way back home at night, would watch kash phool sway under the moonlight,” he recalls.
Bijan Ghosh of BB Block agrees. “My first play here was Ali Baba in 1986, directed by theatre personality Falguni Chatterjee, who lived in AA Block. Back then no one wanted to come to Salt Lake but the dressers and make-up men would show up eagerly as theatre was thriving here and audiences from other blocks would give them more business,” he says.
Subrata Hore of BA Block recalls how romance blossomed on their stage and their hero and heroine went on to get married in real life. “Once minutes before a show, a man came up to us and said he was the play’s author! We were overjoyed and seated him in the front row. He later said we enacted it just as he had imagined it,” says Hore, adding that Falguni Chatterjee always came over to watch them too.
CG Block has once felicitated some writers during the Pujas. “Tarapada Roy was one of them and we mentioned that we had dramatised his story Kandogyan and would be enacting it later during the festival. He was very happy and returned to the block to watch it,” says Sambit Gan.
Deepa Bhattacharjee of CK Block has retired from staging theatre now but recalls how excited they would be while preparing and how depressed they would be once it finished. “For months afterwards we would discuss our mistakes and how funny we looked in beards and moustaches. Those days it wasn’t easy to find men for plays so the ladies club members of CK-CL Block would take on all roles themselves,” she says.
Subrata Nayak has been directing plays in CD Block for 45 years and remembers the rush to perform back in the day. “There used to be so many actors that we would have to do multiple plays to accommodate them – a play each for kids, youth, women, and adults,” he says.
Cut to 2023, when the block will not be staging a play at all. “We can’t find actors anymore. Last year we had managed somehow and this year the criterion for choosing the play was the least number of characters. We selected a drama with only seven roles but that has become an uphill task. We have had to cancel the play,” says the man who has even directed water ballets in the BF Block swimming pool in the past.
“There was a time when I went door-to-door asking actors to participate. But now no one has the time or interest. A song or dance requires less practice so that’s what they put up,” says Nimai Chand Gupta of BJ Block.
Commitment missing
Some veterans, on condition of anonymity, said their block’s themes had become so huge that there was no scope for cultural programmes anymore. Others said participants had no time to devote to rehearsals.
“Now the attitude is that: ‘Koshto kore rehearsal ey ashchi’. The joy of theatre is lost,” says Hore of BB Block.
Ghosh of BB Block recalls how he fulfilled his role on stage back in the day, despite hearing of his grandmother’s demise.
Sarkar of BF Block recalls how an actor — Swarupa Basu Mallik — was so engrossed in memorising lines one day that she swallowed her daughter’s medicine instead of feeding it to the child! “I myself would rehearse dialogues in the bus with such earnestness that it would startle passengers,” he smiles.
“How to demand such dedication from residents when they reach home no sooner than 9pm? Some want to perform but ask for small roles as it would require less practice,” says Ghosh, who is also directing neighbouring BC Block’s women’s play this year. Parthasarathi Upadhyay, who directs children in HB Block, agrees. “Kids want to perform but parents send them to everything from guitar to abacus classes so they don’t have time. They drop out of plays after Class IX and return only after joining college or office,” he says.
Changing themes
Back in the 80s and 90s, heavy-duty plays like Rakta Karabi or Nati Binodini would create ripples across Salt Lake, but now it’s the same few names that do the rounds every year — Hashir Phashi, Srimati Bhoyonkari, Bharate Chai — the common theme is humour.
“We have neither the actors nor the courage to pick up plays by the likes of Badal Sircar these days,” says Hore. “Thanks to the advent of daily soaps and mobile phones, the audience doesn’t want to think anymore. They just want to be entertained.” “Manoj Mitra plays are the safest bet today,” says Partha Pratim Gupta of New Town’s BA Block.
This year he and his neighbours are putting up Mitra’s Prabhat Phire Esho. “We had tried a political play a couple of years ago but it didn’t cut ice with the audience that has the patience only for light subjects.”
A few performers, again on condition of anonymity, said they had proposed political plays but that they got shot down by the block committees in recent years. “How can they allow something negative against the administration that is granting them Rs 70,000 to organise the puja?” one of them said.
Changing audience
Arnab Kumar Bhattacharya of AA Block says the OTT and reality TV-watching audience today wants new content. “Contemporary is the key. The old style of theatrics is gone. Themes have to be topical and the dialogues conversational,” says the actor who also writes scripts for block plays.
In CG Block, Gan and his friends will be performing after a long span this year. “Our group’s last show was Chomchom Kumar in 2008, after which we took off for college. This year we are back for the sake of nostalgia but had a tough time selecting the play,” says Gan, who bought three or four books of theatre scripts from College Street for the purpose. They’ve chosen Manoj Mitra’s Befolle Mullo Ferot but have edited part of it to suit the short attention span of the audience.
Sangita Saha of CJ Block is directing kids to an Abol Tabol tribute this year. Last year she had adapted a piece she had read online about Durga’s family debating if it was worth making the trip to earth. “The audience wants a contemporary twist to tales but it’s also our responsibility to introduce kids to classics so they develop a taste for it,” she says.
Nayak of CD Block doesn’t have much faith in the audience today either way. “A chunk of residents is addicted to inane serials. They won’t leave home even during the Pujas, let alone watch neighbours in action,” he says.
A far cry from the 80s, when in CF Block once, the audience stayed put till after midnight. “Everyone knew the story but said they weren’t able to leave till the hero and heroine were united,” smiles Sarkar. “We usually performed family dramas with happy endings but once did a sad story Tahar Naam Ranjana. The next day an elderly resident scolded me and asked me never to do such plays again. “Jano koto baar amay choshma khulte hoyechhe?’ he exclaimed, leaving me speechless.”
Once CF Block’s play featured a ‘gaan er lorai’ that was such a hit that on public demand they had to repeat it during the bhashan procession. “Nowadays, the only ones sitting in the audience are family members of performers,” says Sarkar, who no longer acts in plays.