Any group and director realize what a challenge staging a Shakespeare classic poses. Inevitable comparisons with previous productions and the plethora of critical interpretations complicate the matter, exemplified by the two current Bengali Hamlets (see my reviews). Anya Theatre’s Romeo ebang Juliet enters the scene with a similar contemporary look, and largely succeeds.
Director Abanti Chakraborty resorts to Debesh Roy’s fairly faithful translation, into which she interpolates a compact dramatization of Jan Otčenášek’s Czech novel Romeo, Julie (not Juliet) and Darkness, without making the resulting amalgamation inordinately long. The unexpected digression midway, occurring in Nazi-occupied Prague under the ominous Swastika, where a Jewish girl receives shelter from a local collegian, imparts immediate topicality to the tragedy like Utpal Dutt’s Barricade set against Hitler’s rise to power, and conveys the threat of communal hatred without recourse to the usual Indian adaptation along Hindu–Muslim lines.
Chakraborty’s two other derivations from Shakespeare do not convince and can be safely omitted. Instead of Friar Laurence, she inserts three witches, much overused in Bengali theatre of late. And an allusion to Cleopatra’s snake by Juliet adds nothing whatsoever. However, Chakraborty’s respectful tip of her hat to West Side Story works well: the concept of a musical pervades her beginning, though it fades away later, and the finger-snapping routine borrowed from the opening sequence of West Side Story clicks. Subhadeep Guha’s live five-piece band complements the acting, the production reaching a climax with “Eki lābanye purna prāna” as the lovers take their wedding vows, at which point the interval should ideally occur. The stepladder used for the balcony reminds me of Thornton Wilder’s directions for another beautiful drama of young love, Our Town.
Rwitobroto Mukherjee impresses as Romeo, but Shweta Bagchi’s savvy Juliet (photo) does not present the accepted picture of an innocent 13-year-old. If he acts both Romeos, why do two actresses perform Juliet and Julie (albeit played quite realistically by Manjuri Dey)? Of the supporting cast, an overbearing Tathagata Chaudhuri (Tybalt) and mercurial Sankar Baidya (Mercutio) make strong impacts. Among details requiring rectification, Mercutio does not belong to the Montagues, therefore should not wear their uniform red tie; Romeo in disguise should certainly not sport this conspicuous red tie at the Capulet ball (whose men wear blue ties); wedding rings customarily adorn the left rather than the right hand; and Tybalt is conventionally pronounced Tibalt, not Tie-balt.
7 August 2024