The stage is set...

The seventh edition of NCPA’s Centrestage that kicked off yesterday, saw the the theatre festival begin with a bang with Meherzad Patel’s English play The Relationship Agreement. But the excitement continues as the theatre festival of premiering plays has a lot more in store. Fifteen multilingual plays in English, Hindi, Gujarati and Marathi with a dash on Malayalam, Sanskrit and Urdu are expected to be showcased between November 25 and December 4. Says Deepa Gahlot, Head – Programming (Theatre & Film), NCPA, “Centrestage is a celebration of the art of theatre in its myriad forms. We try to present theatre lovers an array of theatre through handpicked plays, which reflect the diversity of language, stories, genres and performances. The festival is a true representative of the Mumbai spirit.”  After Hrs takes its pick of the lot...

Raat Na Aaye
Hindi play (Nov 26)

Translated and adapted from Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey Into Night by Mohd Zeeshan Ayyub, this Hindi play is the story of a family devastated by its past memories. Throwing light on the story, Ayyub says that the play is about the internal conflicts and factors that affect relationships. Yashpal Singh is a famous actor whose career is in ruins, while his wife Bala has just returned from a rehabilitation centre. The elder son is a frustrated TV actor and the younger one has cancer. “On the face of it, it is this family’s story but when you read between the lines, it could be any family’s story,” says Ayyub, who adds that there is a certain Chekhovian quality to the play, that of the subtext being woven into the story. Directed by Rasika Agashe, the play stars Agashe, Manish Verma, Aseem Hattangadi and Tushar Pandey.

Phir Se Shaadi!?
Hindi play (Nov 27)

Written and directed by Imran Rasheed, the play tells the story of Aiman and Sheeba, who want to remarry after divorcing each other six months back. But according to the Sharia law, Sheeba needs to gets married to another man, consummate their marriage and then get divorced. They approach Professor Kamaal Khan, played by actor Danish Hussain, to be the dummy groom, but the Professor has some plans of his own. “It’s then that the play becomes extremely funny,” says Hussain, adding that he liked the playfulness of the story and the social satire its presenting. 

Qissebaazi
Multilingual performance (Nov 29)

Storytelling has always appealed to actor-director Danish Hussain and he returns to it with a multilingual performance. Four stories will be presented to the audience in two languages each. “We have a vast heritage of rich literature in our own languages which is out there already. All we need to do is perform it well,” he says. Since a lot of these languages may not be accessible to the audience, they will  perform them in two languages, the core language in which the literature has been written and the the bridge language. “The storytelling will be in a stylised and dramatised way,” he informs us. 

Shakuntala Awaits
English play (Nov 30)

Indian American playwright, singer and screenwriter, Isheeta Ganguly’s play is a 2016 take on the Shakuntala story. Shakuntala, a physician from Canada meets Dushyant, a professor from Cambridge in Mumbai and it turns into a night of conversations and passion. In the end, Ganguly’s Shakuntala chooses to walk away. Ganguly has left the ending of the play that stars Purva Bedi and Samrat Chakraborty, open. “The difference between this Shakuntala and the one in the epic is that the former had a choice. Women today are economically, socially and educationally empowered. They don’t need a man to complete their sense of identity,” she adds. 

Facial, Pedicures and Mind Masala
English play (Dec 2)

Written by Divya Jagdale and developed, designed and performed by her and Tannishtha Chatterjee, the plot revolves around two women, one a housewife, and the other, who is a working professional. They strike up a friendship, only to delve into a number of subjects. Jagdale describes the play as a funny, witty, batty comedy. “Tannishtha and I have had several conversations over the years, which I always felt held the germ of an idea that could be crafted into a play about two women, which stops being about women halfway through it,” she says. “It has a kind of a streak of spirituality and transcends into another space altogether,” she adds. 

Life at 40
English stand-up comedy (Dec 3)

Anuvab Pal believes it’s time to look back upon how stand up started in 2010, and the really embarrassing things they had to do in the earlier years to survive. “It’s a full-fledged profession now, but we have had to do some crazy things to reach here,” he says. “The more uncomfortable it got for me, the funnier it will be for the audience. But I can laugh at it after seven years,” he adds. Since Centrestage is mainly a theatre festival, Pal says his effort is to perform it like a one-man play, construct it with acts and not just make it a stand-up show.

Other plays

Dhaaba – Non-verbal object theatre performance (Nov 26)
Naribai – Hindi play (Nov 27)
Absolute – Marathi play (Nov 28)
Do Deewane Shehar Main – Gujarati play (Dec 1)
Dohri Zindagi – Hindi play (Dec 2)
It’s About Time – English play (Dec 3)
Dreamz – Hindi play (Dec 4)
Stand Up – English play (Dec 4)