The festival will be a collage of plays, says the festival director, Sayandeb Bhattacharya
| Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Four plays will be staged on July 20 as part of SmaranniK Theatre Festival 2024. “The plays will be presented as Show 1 and Show 2 with breaks in between,” says the festival director, Sayandeb Bhattacharya, who is also the founder of the theatre group.
SmaranniK, which Sayandeb says, means something worth remembering, was established in 2012 as a Bengali theatre group in Bengaluru. “SmaranniK Theatre Festival commenced in 2013 and this is our 11th edition. The festival and group is not just my brainchild, but all of us, as theatre is always a group activity.”
SmaraniK has, over the past decade, produced six plays, organized 10 theatre festivals, 10 theatre workshops, four theatre lectures. There were 11 core members when the group was founded, Sayandeb says. “Only six are still currently active as the others moved out of Bengaluru. The festival, is organised every year to present the some of the best Bengali plays in Bengaluru.”
The theatre festival, Sayandeb says, is also a way to celebrate the group’s anniversary, which is in the end of June. “It is not always possible to organise a festival on the exact date. We aim to celebrate the festival between July and August. The focus is to promote the perspective that theatre has a no language barrier. We watch plays in every language and I believe theatre is a universal language.”
The other aim of organising the Theatre Festival, Sayandeb says, is to bring plays that are directed by veteran theatre directors and actors. “With SmaranniK, they can watch Bengali plays in Bengaluru.”
The one-day festival, Sayandeb says, aims to work as a cultural platform. “There will be a variety of food stalls, books and music. There will be Bengali books and cuisine as well cuisines, books and music from other regions.”
Sayandeb took to theatre as a child aged five in Kolkata and has worked with veterans including Bibhas Chakraborty and his father, Meghnad Bhattacharya. “I moved to Bengaluru in 2005 and took a break as I had to focus on studies. Then I picked up theatre again in 2007,” says the 42-year-old theatre practitioner, who currently lives in Mahadevpura.
Show 1 will commence with Sayam-Er-Aalo, SmaranniK’s new play, directed by Sayandeb and staged at 3pm. The second play, Andhakarer Utso Hote, is written and directed by Sangeet Natak Akademi Awardee, Bibhas Chakraborty, and features theatre doyens such as Meghnad Bhattacharya and Sima Mukherjee. “The play embraces the light of hope from the source of darkness in a middle-class, Bengali family.”
Sayandeb Bhattacharya
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement
Bandher Dosh Din (5.30pm) followed by Tomar Ami will be staged as part of Show 2. “Bandher… will feature the veteran film and theatre actor, Rajatava Dutta, and the play revolves around the life of Subhabrata, whose life changes drastically when he moves to a small, two-roomed flat in Behala, with his wife and daughter. How they cope with unforseen circumstances and what they learn is forms the crux of the play.”
Tomar, Sayandeb says, is performed by Sangeet Natak Academy Award winning actor, Debsankar Halder. “It is a Bengali adaptation of Evald Flaser’s Take me in your Hands. The play takes us to the world of books in Kolkata’s College Street and portrays an unusual love story between Ajit, an older well-educated man and a sophisticated bookshop owner and Maya, a younger sales girl who lives in a slum but is hungry for knowledge”.
SmaranniK Theatre Festival 2024 will be held on July 20 at MLR Convention Centre, JP Nagar (near Brigade Millenium) from 3pm. Tickets are available on BookMyShow or call 9741408132.
