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Dramatic solutions to depression
IMAGINE THE following : A convict in a jail who has forgotten to smile and is fortified by despair. An octagenarian woman who is strapped to a wheelchair and is fortified by loneliness. An autistic child whose mind and body refuses to coordinate and is fortified by invincibility.
And then one day, smile returns on the face of the convict. The old lady is able to cheerfully mingle with others. The autistic child is able to partially overcome the crisis of movement and coordination.
All these people experienced an unique turnaround in their lives while fighting the tricks of destiny and the man who made it possible is Parasuram Ramamoorthi, a name perhaps familiar to many in the temple city.
With his prescription of "drama therapy", the suave Head of the Theatre Arts Department at Madurai Kamaraj University, stopped their lives from turning into an extended nightmare.
From Madurai prison to a London jail, and old age homes to special schools for the mentally challenged children in the U.K, Prof.Ramamoorthi is known for downsizing dilemma and difficulties of scores of individuals with his unique formula that combines all elements of performing arts. Besides his artistic flair, dollops of sunny optimism keep him and his increasing clan of admirers going.
There is an obsession behind this man, who was invited as a visiting professor for drama at the University of East Anglia in Leverhulme last year. It was there that his "conscious and wilful attempt to use drama for healing people" turned out to be a huge success. His confidence and passionate commitment proved a bulwark against all adversities and personal tragedies and brought his target groups "out of the feeling of frozen time".
Things did not happen overnight. Prof.Ramamoorthi - known more as a playwright-director having scripted a dozen plays -- has been dabbling in drama therapy since 1992. In 2001 he took up a project with 10 prisoners lodged in Madurai jail who were unable to countenance the dishonour they had brought upon themselves and their respective families. He worked with them for an year to help them into the process of "psychic evolution".
With his repertoire of creative thoughts and motivating vocabulary, he began his sessions with story telling. "I first used the movement therapy extensively, acting out the situations in the story I was narrating. There was a bit of everything in those enactments - humour, grief, joy, an array of emotions the prisoners could relate to their lives. Slowly from observers they became participants."
Next, they were initiated into writing therapy, encouraged to pen down whatever thought crossed their mind. It worked. The group responded favourably. From doomed loners they became gregarious, sharing ideas, cracking jokes, talking about each other's problems, helping each other look for a solution.
`This is where the success of drama therapy lies. It has to be a participatory approach invoking all senses of an individual. It is a stimulant to trigger off the healing process," underlines Prof.Ramamoorthi, who is a trifle disappointed by the bureaucratic wrangles for undertaking a second project in Madurai jail now.
But what gives him immense satisfaction is that the first batch of prisoners are "transformed individuals". They communicate with him and in every word there is a "sense of hope and cheer". They are even trying to impart what they learnt to the fellow inmates in an attempt to bring them out of their shells of despondency.
Prof.Ramamoorthi got interested in the medium in1992 when he was invited to work with a group of convicts in a jail in London. He took on the task of rehabilitating the prisoners using drama as the potential tool for change. Here he started with a game of hurling abuses. Unleashing vituperatives helped them to release their anger. Once the opportunity to shout and scream was created without any fear or inhibition, they suddenly became free. A study showed decreased BP levels and they started evincing interest in reading, writing, singing and talking.
The success prompted Prof.Ramamoorthy to pursue the subject further. It took him more than a decade to be convinced of drama's therapeutic value. His stint as MKU professor has not been very productive as there are no takers for the course. After the first batch of 12 students, there's been a dry patch. "In India, we are not able to draw the 18 to 25 years generation to theatre. The youth is only chasing big-money career rather than a creatively rewarding vocation," he regrets. However, it does not bog him down from pursuing his interests. Besides plays, he has authored poems and has lost count of the number of times he has read the Mahabharata.
"With each reading surfaces a new and intriguing aspect,'' he says. In his own way, Prof.Ramamoorthi has tried to demystify the great epic with a touch of contemporaneity. His bold attempt has earned him several laurels abroad including his latest production, "Vanaprasthanam", the story of Kunti combining dance, music and story-telling in a colourful theatre presentation.
Last year, it created waves at Leverhulme fetching him a local award. "It is the celebration of a woman, who speaks directly to the audience unfolding herself at various stages of life - as a young girl full of dreams, as the remorseful mother who abandons her child and as the aged and desolate queen who seeks peace after learning the bitter lessons of betrayal and war".
In a major move, Prof.Ramamoorthi took this play to an old age home in Norwich. And to his amazement he found that Kunti worked as a "reminiscising therapy" for the 20-odd inmates. "Kunti's conflict is like every individual's predicament, torn between desire, duty and devotion. The old home inmates related to the play so well that soon after its staging, they impromptu began interacting with each other, going back to their past revealing their problems".
"The aged have no communication with the world. By using Kunti as a reminiscence therapy, I saw them change from recluses cocooned by their loneliness and fear to eager communicators", he says.
His second project that earned him accolades was with autistic children where he effectively used a combination of music, light, sound, visuals, colours, objects and the feel of touch to set their imagination afire.
"Within days, the children started responding, shaking to music, recognizing colours and sounds, attempting to clap or draw or gesture out a story, relating to visuals shown,'' according to Prof.Ramamoorthi.
He strongly believes now that drama therapy reduces the clinical prescription of those suffering from chronic depression, mental handicap, psychic problems or are schizophrenic.
"Drama therapy does not replace medicines but it definitely reduces its intake. It has been scientifically studied and proved abroad that drama therapy caters to both clinical and social need quickening the pace of healing," says the University don. But unfortunately, there are no takers either for the academic course or for putting the medium to its potential use in India.
Prof.Ramamoorthi does conduct workshops across the country to arouse the people to this new form.
"Music and dance are used separately as a therapy,'' he says, asserting that a combination of all as in drama is being practiced for the first time by him alone. Before he sets off for another stint at the Leverhulme University - this time for "Applying Health Practice" - Prof.Ramamoorthi is keen that his services are used with equal acknowledgement and appreciation in his land. So far the Karnataka Spastic Society and a school for the mentally challenged children in Madurai have shown some interest. The discipline is still in its nascent stage here and the wait, therefore, perhaps a wee bit longer.
SOMA BASU
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