LitSoc Dramatics started yesterday at the Central Lecture Theatre. The coords waited for a while for the hall to get filled up but soon realized the futility of that and let the event start. Two hostels, Jamuna and Godavari put up their performances in front of a nearly-empty CLT.
Jamuna performed ‘The Patricide’, an original written by Karthik who doubled up as the director as well. Starting off on a cryptic note and leaving the audience clueless, it gradually made sense, revealing an intriguing plot. One Mr.Orange is on his deathbed and wills behind a fortune for his son. Of the four characters on stage one is the son and three others are grandsons but none knows who is who. Throw in a doctor, a lawyer (played by the same person) and a patricide by medical overdose and the plot is complete. The grandsons want the son killed to inherit the fortune and everyone scrambles to find out the son’s identity. The performances were mostly passable. In several parts, the script was almost overdone in terms of its abstractness. It seemed to scream, “This is abstract theatre. It is pseud.” And of course the secret to any self-written performance is a gay couple and lots of swearing. However accounting for the fact that this was an attempt at a mostly original script, Jamuna deserve credit and the play was fairly appreciated by those in the audience who did listen.
Godavari performed a very slightly modified version of ‘A Simple Task’ by Alan Haehnel, directed by Arun ‘Mu’ Chandran. Bob has a simple first assignment at his first job: retrieve a box of merchandise for his ‘Boss’. But he finds that the required box is blocked by a parade of confusing characters, that his Boss keeps changing identities, and his whole career starts feeling absurd. When he finally does retrieve the box, he finds out that the box is actually empty and that his ‘Boss’ is missing from his seat. On the strength of the script and a solid Bob by Bob, the wonder that is a mallu accent and the synchronised guards, the play went off reasonably well. Most of the actors were tight and the part of the ‘audience’ (It’s a bit rich calling ten people, two cores, three coords, two judges, two photography vols and one GA coord an audience) that had given up on ‘The Patricide’ sat up and had a few hearty laughs.
Five plays that were scheduled for Sunday have been washed away by a cyclone that will probably go to Andhra Pradesh. These will be performed sometime next semester. Please do come and watch.
Covered by Vinay Hegde, Correspondent
