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Business News/ News / Business Of Life/  Straddling screen and stage
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Straddling screen and stage

CinePlay will show two popular plays at New Delhi's India Habitat Centre

Maskara and Das (right).Premium
Maskara and Das (right).

NEW DELHI :

It might seem a bit counterintuitive, but Mumbai-based entrepreneur Subodh Maskara says he has good reason to film theatre productions and screen those instead of organizing live performances. This weekend, Maskara’s CinePlay Digital Pvt. Ltd is showing Adhe Adhure and Bombay Talkies—the plays were written 50 years apart—at the India Habitat Centre in New Delhi.

For those who want to watch veteran actor Lillete Dubey in Hindi playwright Mohan Rakesh’s 1960s drama about the modern Indian family, Adhe Adhure, or see the life stories of eight Mumbaikars unfurl through a series of monologues in Vickram Kapadia’s 2011 play, Bombay Talkies, Maskara says the screenings will offer “the best seats in the house" to everybody. Because the cinematography resembles an actual movie rather than a recording of a live theatre performance, the cameras go on to the stage, close to where the action is. The film is shot over days instead of a single performance, with many takes and retakes, he says.

Maskara, who made his theatre debut opposite wife Nandita Das in Between The Lines two years ago, likens the experience to watching live and recorded cricket matches while growing up. “I would go to the stadium for the experience, but come back and watch the recorded match again to observe the finer aspect of play," he says.

In Adhe Adhure, the protagonist, Savitri, carries the financial burden of her family, comprising an unemployed husband and three children. Even as she struggles to secure a job for her son, Savitri’s exploitative boss makes sexual overtures. In Bombay Talkies, eight characters, including a child artiste, a mother and a stockbroker, talk about their lives and aspirations in Mumbai.

“Bombay Talkies is probably the most challenging production that CinePlay will ever make," says Kapadia in a phone interview from Mumbai. “It’s one thing for an actor to give a monologue on stage while interacting with an audience, and quite another to speak to a camera and hold people’s interest."

Viewers can also expect to see a relatively higher level of production than is typically seen on the Indian stage, says Maskara. “Overseas, the productions run for months together. They can afford to be more elaborate in their set design and production. In India, you rent a venue for a day or two, for a few shows," he says. The CinePlay films are made on a budget of 20-50 lakh each. “We intend to go to Inox-es and television (in addition to plans for showing the plays on pay-per-view basis, for 200-600, on the CinePlay digital platform), so the quality has to be as good as anything else on those platforms," says Maskara.

CinePlay first started screening plays at Mumbai’s National Centre for the Performing Arts in February.

From the theatre groups’ point of view, Maskara says, the films cut the cost of multi-city tours. “After Mumbai and Delhi, we are taking the plays to tier 2 and tier 3 cities and towns; places that these plays would never have gone to earlier," he says. The theatre groups also get a share in the profits from each screening, he adds.

For Kapadia, one of the main reasons for collaborating with CinePlay for Bombay Talkies was the idea of documenting his play. “I started acting in the early 1980s and formed my theatre group in 1987, but I have nothing to show for those years unless I revive a production," says Kapadia. “With CinePlay, the play gets documented with some dignity. It’s not just a three- camera set-up recording a live performance. It’s a new genre, a new territory, and I am interested to see what we can do with it."

Vickram Kapadia’s Bombay Talkies will be shownon 2 August, 7pm, and Adhe Adhure, by Lillete Dubey’s Primetime Theatre Company, on 3 August, 7pm, at Stein Auditorium, India Habitat Centre, Lodi Road, New Delhi. Tickets, 200, 300 and 500, available at the venue.

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Published: 31 Jul 2014, 09:05 PM IST
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