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`Save the last waltz for me'

Mrinalini Sarabhai and Tom Alter chat about dance, acting, life and food

CATCHING UP Tom Alter and Mrinalini Sarabhai exchange experiences and pleasantries PHOTO: K. RAMESH BABU

One is a renowned danseuse and the other an equally well-known actor. He calls her Amma, just as everyone else does. Mrinalini Sarabhai and Tom Alter need no introduction. They go back many years, culminating in the production of The Mahatma and the Poetess, a unique presentation of letters between the father of the nation, Mahatma Gandhi and the Nightingale, Sarojini Naidu.

A Take Two between the two reverberates with a fluid rhythm, an emotional shorthand born out of a long association as MINI ANTHIKAD-CHHIBBER discovers in the flow and eddy of conversation.

Tom Alter: I agreed to this only because you did...

Mrinalini Sarabhai: And I did because you did! So for this, you do a solo tonight.

Tom Alter: I am worried suppose you include this conversation in your updated autobiography. Incidentally, I think it is simply fantastic. I mean when I think of the places you visited and experiences you had at a time when there was no television or Internet, performing in South America in the Fifties is simply amazing.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: That was the time when these places had not even seen Indians!

Tom Alter: I admire the fact that you do not wallow in the past. You live totally in the present. I am in the habit of dwelling in the past. Any of us with even an iota of your experiences would be permanently living in the past.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: That is due to my daughter Mallika who is constantly doing something new. It is an ongoing process and a lot of fun. There is no time to think of the past.

Tom Alter: It is difficult to praise a person who is sitting next to you.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: I shall look away.

Tom Alter: It is wonderful the way you have taken a traditional art form and made it contemporary. You are a pioneer in breaking barriers... The process of bringing The Mahatma and the Poetess on stage was very smooth, wasn't it?

Mrinalini Sarabhai: I enjoy working with you. There were no hurdles.

Tom Alter: It was not just yes, yes. Little things were discussed and ironed out. It was not a superficial exercise. The important thing was the spirit in which the letters have been written. We felt what they felt. It was not acting.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: Exactly, it is all about feeling what the characters feel. I do not feel that I am reading letters.

Tom Alter: And the bits we adlibbed are good fun. So now we can add that bit about you giving your gold bangle to the Mahatma.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: The letters are as real today as they were more than 75 years ago. India is going through the same problems.

Tom Alter: I love that line about the jewellery boxes and I am sure Gandhi must have chuckled when he read it.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: This presentation just grew out of the book. But I did not believe it would do so well.

Tom Alter: I am not surprised with the success. When I read the book and whosoever I gave the book to, all agreed that this was something phenomenal. You remember the reading we did in that pub in Pune? All those girls in itsy-bitsy outfits? I was sure it would not work there.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: Me too. I had my doubts.

Tom Alter: But 30 seconds into the presentation and there was pindrop silence and some of the girls had tears in their eyes.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: That is the audience I want to reach out to.

Tom Alter: I wish I could dance.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: Maybe not Bharatnatyam but we could waltz. I love western dance. So can you waltz?

Tom Alter: It needs a little working on.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: That I can teach you

Tom Alter: So will you save the last waltz for me?

Mrinalini Sarabhai: I first fell in love with your voice and then with you.

Tom Alter: In the amphitheatre at Darpana (Mrinalini's dance school) you sit right at the top. And I thought the only thing that would reach you would be my voice. I'm glad you could hear it.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: Of course I did.

Tom Alter: We first met when I came to Darpana to shoot a television programme about famous mothers and daughters. My first performance at Darpana was the South African poet Athol Fugard's Blood Knot. Fugard, incidentally, played Gen. Smuts in Attenborough's Gandhi.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: Really? I did not know that.

Tom Alter: Before we go for the show, we should stop at this bakery that sells the most amazing pastries. I love the food you serve at your place — it is so healthy, light and scrumptious.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: I just serve what I have.

Tom Alter: I got a chance to spend time with you and the troupe when you had come to Mussoorie and visited Woodstock, my old school.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: I do not know you well enough. When I do I will write you a letter.

Tom Alter: No email?

Mrinalini Sarabhai: My secretary handles emails! I believe in putting pen to paper. It should flow from the heart through the hand to the paper. It is so much more intimate. I love pens and keep collecting them.

Tom Alter: Relationships should not be forced. They should have their own pace.

Mrinalini Sarabhai: Precisely. One just jells with people, otherwise it is no fun.

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