Round and round it went
C. SURESH KUMAR
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‘Round and Round and Round’ was a brave effort.
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Sifar’s play, Round and round.
Sifar’s first attempt onstage was a bold one as they preferred a monologue style with a lone performer for the Round and Round
and Round, a 70-minute Hindi play.
Adapted from famous writer Nirmal Varma’s Dedh Inch Upar, which is a monologue on the atrocities committed by Adolf Hitler on the Jewish community, it was altered to suit the local audience and local conditions by two young artists, Junaid the director of the play and Feroze the actor who did the solo performance.
The play was presented with some creativeness and experimentation which is laudable. The audience was in for a surprise when they found the character of the play already on the stage with the screen parted, much before the play began and there was interaction between the actor and the audience. The play revolves around an aged loner who sits late in the night at a bar drinking and his mind going round and round with thoughts about his past. The loner had lost his wife during the Emergency when many lives were snuffed out. His wife was taken away from their house by the police for keeping anti-government leaflets and other materials at home. He has not seen her since then and believes she is dead; the police had tortured him also, in order to get the truth out of him regarding his wife’s activities.
The thought that his wife never revealed to him her involvement in such activities troubles him so much that he hits the bottle day after day. In flashback he visualises the day his wife went missing and the ransack of their house. The adaptation of the story of the original writer from the awful atrocities of Third Reich cannot be equated or related to what happened during Emergency period, hence it was difficult for the audience to digest that such cruelty happened during Emergency.
So it is better to understand the original writer’s view before one adapts or changes the story.
Irrespective of this fact, the play was enacted well and Feroze could sustain the interest of the audience, though at times the tempo seemed to sag and repetitive moments and positions could have been avoided.
The costumes were designed by Ruchi Agarwal, voice over by Prajakta Phansalkar, and music support by Sunil Chandurkar, and lights design by Sanat and Phani. Sets were designed by Junaid who also directed the play.
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