Everything about Soumitra Chatterjee’s cinematic career has received closeup focus in the myriad articles published since his final exit, but hardly anyone has spotlighted his theatre activities. He remembered fondly his childhood days in Krishnanagar (Nadia, Bengal) where his grandfather and father used to take part in amateur theatre. One
Private auditoriums in Kolkata have reopened at last, following the standard operating procedures advised by health authorities. On October 1, Aneek staged Pirandello o Puppeteer (already reviewed here) at Tapan Theatre. On October 15, the Academy of Fine Arts auditorium reopens with Theatre Formation Paribartak’s Ekti Uttaradhunik Samajik Pala directed
The new Bengali production by the young group Ichchhemato, Ghum Nei, won four of the fourteen awards presented at the Mahindra Excellence in Theatre Awards this year, in META’s first-ever online ceremony last night. They won for Best Male Supporting Actor (Koushik Kar), Best Costume Design (Turna Das and
COVID-19 has decimated the finances of innumerable theatre technicians, actors and support staff who work as daily wage earners, and used to get paid after each performance. Since all auditoria have been locked for the last five months, their source of income has closed. Many Bengali group-theatre artists have got
July 19, 22, 23, 24: Call Cutta At Home is on at the Access Point festival, St. Petersburg, Russia. Conceived by Rimini Protokoll, who have done interactive theatre (where the audience is considered a part of the performance) in Kolkata before, like Call Cutta and Call Cutta In A Box.
Mukul Ahmed of London, no stranger to Kolkata theatre, where he has regularly directed in recent years, has announced a new script competition: https://www.bbc.co.uk/writersroom/opportunities/rafta-scriptwriting?fbclid=IwAR0eKY6yvODzGTioOTyglBbP4UjWYvEb0bHG_foZRts4y0a9CwAj1pAOyiw
My tribute to Usha Ganguli appeared in The Wire, April 2020: https://thewire.in/the-arts/usha-ganguli-tribute
I’ve edited a new book containing the earliest plays of Krishna Mohan Banerjea and Michael Madhusudan Dutt, and the anonymously-written Kaminee, in the 19th century. Titled Indian Drama in English: The Beginnings (Jadavpur University Press). See: https://jadunivpress.com/category/indian-drama-in-english-the-beginnings/ https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kolkata/madhusudan-dutts-english-drama-rizia-makes-it-to-print/articleshow/73218826.cms A conversation discussing the book: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLC-Q2GjX3E A review in The Book Review:
Subrata Pal, who epitomized the invisible but indispensable man behind the scenes of Bengali theatre, doing his work for groups quietly but flawlessly, died recently. For him, theatre organization was just as important and creative as directing or acting. He joined Nandikar on Ajitesh Bandopadhyay’s invitation, but only on condition
