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Magazine
THEATRE
Drama with a distinct vision
GIRISH KARNAD
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Satyadev Dubey created Hindi theatre in Mumbai and made it the crucible of pan-Indian drama.
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“Clarity in speech is a must,” says DUBEY “Bad enunciation is usually a cover for insecurity and confusion.”
Photo: Courtesy Ranga Shankara
Magnificent:Amrish Puri in Dubey’s “Yayati”.
Satyadev Dubey came from Bilaspur in Madhya Pradesh to Mumbai with the intention of becoming a Test Cricketer. Instead, he got ensnared in the world of theatre. He joined the Theatre Unit, the theatre group-cum-school founded by Ebrahim Alkazi. “The teacher who influenced me most, however, was P.D. Shenoy,” says Dubey. “It was he who pointed out to me that the structure of a play is the network of tensions that holds its different parts together. Once that was grasped, everything became clear.” And the characteristic feature of all Dubey’s productions has been the attention to the structure of the play, and the absolute clarity of detail, with no fuzzy corners or unresolved problems.
The recent production of Anouilh’s “Antigone”, which was the closing item of the Ranga Shankara Theatre Festival in Bangalore, is a perfect example of his work. “Antigone” has been long acknowledged as a masterpiece of 20th century theatre but its reputation as an anti-Nazi play invariably casts a long shadow on its interpretations. The play was written during the German occupation of Paris and Anouilh used the Greek myth to defend the right of young Antigone to defy the totalitarian irrationality of Creon. While the German censors could not have missed its political implications, they presumably decided that Creon’s arguments justified their insistence on the maintenance of the rule of the law, and let the play come on boards. Burdened with this background, the play often turns into a long-winded political debate, usually skewed against authority. (Dr. Shreeram Lagoo, for instance, was not permitted to stage the play during the Emergency.)
Poignant production
In his production, Dubey deleted many of Antigone’s romantic lines and reduced the number of characters. In particular, he excised the character of Haemon, Creon’s son and Antigone’s fiancé, a decision which could have made the play even more bereft of emotion. Instead, he explored the human angle of the confrontation, subtly suggesting the affection that Creon (played superbly by Naseeruddin Shah) felt for his niece and prospective daughter-in-law, Antigone (Ratna Pathak Shah in probably the best performance of her career). It was family relations versus public positions, which made the situation infinitely more poignant. “We had to carefully control and place each moment of physical contact between the two actors,” said Dubey in a characteristic remark. “I told them to remember that the audience knew they were married.” The result was a spare, lucid and very moving “Antigone”.
The graph of Dubey’s career has a personal resonance for many of us who saw the emergence of the Indian theatre in the 1970s and rejoiced in the work of the new directors. What has been distressing about the developments since then is the complete collapse of many of the great leaders of this renaissance into inanity. B.V. Karanth’s production of “Hayavadana” for the Nehru Shatabdi Natya Mahotsav in 1989 was so terrible that critics couldn’t believe the same director’s production of the same play had galvanised Indian theatre scene in 1972. Alkazi’s “Taledanda” in 1992 was wooden and seemed to contain no idea more recent than his own “Tughlaq”, produced 20 years before . Habib Tanvir’s current “Raj Rakta” is simply atrocious (and has been touring Europe.) Others are trapped in the straitjacket of their styles. How has Dubey managed to keep himself so alive and sharp even at the age of 72? His reply: “I have never known what I know.”
A needlessly self-effacing remark, one might say, for one of the most successful of our theatre teachers. He taught Amrish Puri and Amol Palekar. He discovered Sunila Pradhan and trained Sonali Kulkarni. He loves to teach, but he loves to be with the young. They keep him young. He was not too well when he came to Bangalore for the opening of “Antigone”, but faced with a group of students, he instantly came alive. “Why do you want to do theatre?” was his first question. The students, who were expecting another set of readymade solutions to the problems of the art, were startled.
Speak up
Then Dubey launched his attack, demanding that the students come out and ‘speak up’ about what they wanted and what they had understood. That is a fundamental principle he believes in. Everyone, and not just actors, must learn to ‘speak up’. “Clarity in speech is a must,” he says, “Bad enunciation is usually a cover for insecurity and confusion.”
I met Dubey in Mumbai on my return from England. I was 25 and had the manuscript of “Yayati” tucked away in my inner pocket. Alkazi had left for Delhi to take charge of the National School of Drama and Dubey had succeeded him at the Theatre Unit. Our meeting didn’t begin too well. “What is the point of writing plays in English?” he suddenly demanded. “How can you write anything meaningful in that language?”
Hesitatingly, I confessed that my play was written, not in English, but in Kannada. Dubey’s face fell. He asked me to read out the play to him. He said he would like to produce it. He was the first person to treat my work as stageable.
Thereafter, I hung around Dubey whenever possible, enjoying the energy of the short farces he produced (some written by himself, some by Chekov) and the frisson of his conversations. He was always bubbling with ideas and forever fighting with people. “I refuse to fight with you,” Vijay Tendulkar told him. I, on the other hand, had several fights with him over the next many years and found them most stimulating.
It took Dubey three difficult years to bring “Yayati” to the stage. But, in the end, he directed a magnificent production with Amrish Puri in the lead role. “Yayati” established Dubey as a theatre director with a distinct vision. That was only the first of a long line of memorable productions of plays from all over India. Badal Sircar’s “Evam Indrajit” and “Pagla Ghoda”, Chandrasekhar Kambar’s “Aur Tota Bola” (“Jokumaraswamy” in original Kannada), Mohan Rakesh’s “Aadhe Adhure”, Tendulkar’s “Khamosh! Adalat Jaari Hai”.
Most spectacular of all was his discovery of Dharam Vir Bharati’s “Andha Yug”. Bharati had written it for the radio and that’s where it would have rested if Dubey hadn’t picked it up and staged it. He then sent the text to Alkazi at the National School and other producers. Today “Andha Yug” is recognised as the play that heralded a new era in Indian theatre.
Unifying force
Single-handed, Dubey created Hindi theatre in Mumbai and made it the crucible of pan-Indian drama. “The Hindi speakers in Mumbai aren’t interested in my theatre. It is the theatre-crazy Marathi-Gujarati audiences that have supported me.” Most of his actors too were either Marathi or Gujarati.
Delhi actors grumbled about their accents, but Dubey dismissed the complaint. “If Hindi is a national language, it can’t have a UP/MP accent.” He saw another unifying force in film music. He argued — even at a time when such ideas had not become academically fashionable —that film music is the true folk music of modern urban India.
Dubey has some hilarious tales of the encounter he created between traditional Bombay middle class and world drama. Sulabha Deshpande, who was brilliant as the lesbian Inez in Sartre’s “No Exit”, discovered what a lesbian was only after the 12fth successful show and was so shocked that she almost refused to go on.
In the last few years, Dubey has not only produced plays in English (Bernard Shaw being a perennial favourite) but has himself written plays in that language. “English is an Indian language now. It’s ours,” he argues. “Indian writers in English have explored areas untouched by vernacular writers.”
That would have certainly infuriated the Dubey of yore. But then that’s what makes Dubey so unique — his ability to infuriate himself.
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