Veteran directors like Salima Raza, Sohaila Kapoor, Bapi Bose will be together to stage some of their brilliant productions at the 30th Bhartendu Natya Utsav. The theatre festival beginning today at Shri Ram Centre is organised by Sahitya Kala Parishad, Department of Art, Culture and languages.
The common feature of the plays that will be staged during the fest is that they all will have a social message. The themes of the plays are different — laila Majnu’s struggle for love, a patriarchal society’s fixation with a male child, characters of Saadat Hasan Manto. Sahitya Kala Parishad for the past three decades has been organising this festival.
The Parishad has revived and projected the age old, time-tested traditions of the country. It has also tried to encourage and provide platform to new and innovative trends in performing arts. The plays will represent our lives and times. The festival will begin with the story of star-crossed lovers laila Majnu. Written by Natharam Gaur and directed by Anil Chaudhary, it will be a musical play.
Another play, Chitralekha, will be based on the well-known novel by the same name by Bhagwati Sharan Verma. The play is directed by Surendra Sharma.
“Right from its inception, the Bhartendu Natya Utsav has been loved and appreciated by theatre lovers. It is a delight for the Sahitya Kala Parishad to provide a platform to actors, directors and playwrights to showcase their art to theatre lovers who yearn for good visual performances,” said JP Singh, Assistant Secretary, Sahitya Kala Parishad.
Other participating plays will be Ek Kutte ki Kahaani, directed by Salima Raza; Kissa Maujpur Ka directed by Chitra Singh; Metamorphosis directed by Kusum Haider; Anaavrit, written and directed by Torit Mitra and Seventeenth July by Baapi Bose.