Avayava 2015, Contemporary Dance Workshop, Day3

Day 3: Let’s look at the workshop on day 3 before peeking into day 2, and hop the sequential order of days! Richard Causer: (10 am to 12 noon) Richard took his class to a more creative moment this morning. The routine for this morning pushed the students to use the letters in their names and create a routine or movement dance using a different body part for an alphabet. The class took some minutes to do so, some taking longer due to the length of the name. A practice, a couple of times and the class performed the routine in groups. Then Richard instructed the class to do it with a partner, where they were to synch their movement to one another. What came out was a harmonic, beautiful dance with lifts and cheers from the audience! Swapnil Dagliya: (12:30 pm to 2:00 pm) Swapnil’class warmed up the body of the dancers with their stretches and small movements.It included slow stretches, flat backs, releve` and plie`to the beats of a drumming music. The class gave out screams of laughter, excitement and disappointment when he made the class lay on the push up position just two inches from the ground. The routine he taught included reaching out your hands up in the air as if plucking something, turning around; the idea of a lyrical routine being to give more freedom to the dancers to improvise than strict-step following. The music is the key in such a routine. The class heartily enjoyed the session and it was a good mix of warm up, travelling across the floor and routines; the class was taken very attentively by the partcipants. Tomas Danielis (3:30 pm to 5:00 pm) Tomas on the third day took the class to new experience in contact improvisation. He showed how to roll the body on the floor without pushing yourself, let the flow move you gently; lying on the floor let your foot lead you body, your neck and then your arm. It was followed by a session on sliding to both your sides, sit up and then step out letting your foot give a swinging motion. Another routine he taught was walking in the natural posture of the human body but backwards and then alternating the steps twice backwards. It was such a hi-tech technique and surely not to be forgotten by the class soon! Hazel Angus (5:30 pm to 7:00 pm) Hazel made the class break into smiles with her introductory session of tap dancing. She introduced the class to the basics: heel, toe and ball. Then a combination of heel and toe to the right and then to the left. A whole tap dance song was played and the class was swaying to the pepped up beats. It so felt like a party class; and Hazel also asked the class to move thier hands with their feet which lifted the general mood of the class from esoteric workshops, hi-tech techniques to plain celebration. The third day of the workshops witneessed pure joy and celebration and brought loads of new techniques for the dancers to work and develop. Until next year, adios!

Avayava 2015, Contemporary Dance Workshop, Day 2

Richard Causer (11:30 am to 1 pm) Richard did the same sequence as in the first day of the workshop giving time to the class to absorb the information. He did the crawling sequence as part of the floorwork preparation. And also the running sequence which was a travelling sequence at high speed. You may not be surprised to see people runnig at high speed in the city or doing Spider-Man crawls inspired by the workshop. Tomas Danielis (11:30 am to 1 pm ) Tomas took the class to another level of sensitivity asking the class to touch just the joints of the body and let the partner respond. So the touch went to the neck, the shoulders, the elbow joint, wrist, finger, hip, knees and toes. He also cleared common misunderstandings about movement of the shoulders. After the movement was complete the partner just stood back and watched the partner move to the earlier stimuli in a dance.This is one of the best technique of Contact Improvisation I have witnessed so far. The technique could create microscopic movements of awareness; pure science. The contact improved among the student at the end of the class! Noam Eidelman (2pm to 3:30 pm ) Like yesterday, the Gaga technique took the class to slow movements to open up the pent up areas and bring a flow and a let go. Noam used the same symbolism as yesterday’s class and it was equally effective. Noam Eidelman (4pm to5:30pm) ‘Holding a camera position’ turning backwards, chopping your head with your hands, and facing the wall again. Then the power packed thrusts where you dance like shooting canon balls out of your pelvic ; and you close it by acting like closing the window and the banging of the head on the wall facing you; welcome to a full- fledged-batsheva-repertory . The routine had really simple and small movements which Noam asked the class to repeat again and again until the class burst into a tumult of energy, passion and a dancing-insanity. The routine felt like a creation of a dance company!

Oka Boka Tiloka, a review

A sense of peace climbed to my senses when I reached Mahatma Jyotirao Phule Sanskrutik Bhavan in Wanowrie. The auditorium had warmth which put the setting in for the play, there were three sticks placed on stage standing on one another with decorations on them making them look like tribe-inspired. And there was tribe-inspired music playing which gave such a glow to the ‘to be’ dramatic experience. The lights looked lovely on stage and they were focussed on the sticks. The opening scene has three characters in loin cloths making animal or bird sounds: Tigura-dugara-dugar. The sync among the characters was well done and it felt so natural and just made me feel how drama is different and special from other forms of performance art. Three friends live peacefully in a village setting until their peace is disturbed. The story was a mellow-coated-slow-paced-one. One of the friends falls in love with a girl and she lures him to the forbidden fruit of development, modernization and governance. And he comes back trying to carry out the designs in practice which only leads to a farce. Oka Boka Tiloka talks about development using a self-introspective approach and the theatre group of Mumbai , Kathakar-Theatre, Stories & Life succeeds in doing just that! Do catch their next show!

Bombay Velvet, a review

The ruggedness of a trailer which has Ranbir Kapoor running across a shipyard has stayed with me for quite sometime and it got vent in ‘Bombay Velvet’.A technical brilliance is staring at you if you see any bit of the movie, a new found charm of bollywood , a culminating of experimental cinema. Johnny Balraj is an underdog who climbs his way up doing crimes and fighting in the boxing ring in Mumbai. I enjoyed the music of the film like a delicious dish and it was a charm -coated-film.I feel the expanse of one film was not enough for the director to speak his mind, that’s why the Rosie singing part is quite accentuated in the film.I am waiting for the director’s next film. But inveritably it’s a good make, and an ambitious work such as this is good for Indian cinema. It makes Indian cinema audacious in approaching topics and approaches to showing stories. A film like Bombay Velvet may take time to sink in.Also a film is sometimes a trigger to watching another set of films. The NewYork Times says, Bombay Velevt is an ‘ode to the American ganster’ but hasn’t the director paid an ode to the American gangsters already with his ‘Gangs of Wassepur’ film and has already left contemporary filmmakers of Bollywood behind. Bombay Velvet is an ode to the technical infrastructure of Bollywood to chisel out such a work of art! Go watch Bombay Velvet!

Gangs of Wassepur 1, a review

History and filmmaking will charm you when they come together and Gangs of Wassepur is one of those rare movies. Wassepur is a place close to Dhanwad district in Bihar now in Jharkhand. The rawest of human emotions come climbing onscreen in this interesting historical depiction. The music and script form the highpoint of the movie.’O Womaniya’ , ‘ O Womaniya’ , Sneha Khandewal’s music and Varun Grover’ s lyrics is such an achievement in the film. The wails of Nagma giving birth to a childish like the seen-felt-ignored-suffering of the state , it breathes emotional hurt of a city.The director, Mr Anurag Kashyap is such an audacious story-teller. The local-lingo of the city is captured well , like ‘ dal me tadka layette kya’. The dialogues are witty and are punch lines in Hindi cinema. It reminds me of an interview I read of Mr. Kashyap long back, where he says,he seems to have gobbled the hindi literature in its fullness, and his command is but visible.The killing scenes remind me of an Iranian film at PIFF this year. The actors in the film have delivered a solid punch line like Manoj Vajpayee , Pramod Pathak, Bhupesh Singh, Nazawaiduddin Siddqui. There a scene where perpendicular is shot and called to the bed, it’s very well done, the script and execution part. I really want to know under what conditions the movie was shot, a fast paced story.The local gestures picked up in the film is typical of Bihar. The film is a creation if a complex mind unfolding stories of an era; the director !The performances are memorable and they get into the skin if the Bihari culture.The clime of the space is captured well.The sweat, muck and stink will stay with you..promise..it will be back.

Clearing the Rubble,a dramatic reading, Moonbeam Factory Theatre

The cast of the dramatic play welcomes you with their costume at the beloved Pagdandi Books Chai Cafe in Baner.Moonbeam Factory Theatre, a local theatre company, who celebrate their first anniversary this month; are doing a dramatic reading of a radio play,” Clearing the Rubble” by Mahesh Dattani. Even before the play started , I thought of ‘Final Solutions’ which I happened to watch a couple of years back by the playwright. What kept coming back to my mind is the “powerful” impact of the play which has a communal context and driving music. The reading of a radio play is a first in Pune and the execution of it by Moonbeam Factory Theatre explored the medium of voice in storytelling.Watching a play allows you to focus on the sight, sound and gesture of the body . In a radio play you focus mostly on the voice which is a new experience altogether. The cast used the voices in the reading very well, which comprised of Srijan Dubey as Salim, Angad Patwardhan as Jeffrey and Divya Mangwani as Fatima. Also to be in the costume and not make many gestures also adds to the dramatic element, as you expect action but what mostly comes out is the voice. ‘Clearing the Rubble’ is set in Gujarat 2001 when an English journalist is going to Bhuj after a massive earthquake to track a boy he met during the relief efforts. The story that the mother has to share is poignant, like her wails “Allah!Both my daughters are with you now. I am coming too.”Rubble, meagre shelters and food packets describe the landscape. Jeffrey approaches a crib rocked by a mother only to find there is no baby in it. He is confused if to help as a journalist or not, but he atleast wants to try, even trying will appear as help. Even through the turmoil Fatimah assures herself by saying,” The mosque is all right! Oh! We are fortunate! Everything will be fine soon. Everything will be like before.” Faith still gave hope in the land and it becomes even more sensitive in such an incident. The play and the dramatic reading by the cast was such a gem of an experience. Do look out for more by Moonbeam Factory Theatre and their upcoming one-minute play festival, Zoom! Cast: Srijan Dubey, Angad Patwardhan, Divya Mangwani Sound Effects: Saeesh Mangwani

Ek Akhari Baar, Anonymous Theatre Group, Bharat Natya Mandir

The quality and substance in the drama making process has quadrupled in the city; in terms of the story, sets and actors.Experimentation is the flavour of the season and the audience love it. Ek Akhari Baar, presented by Anonymous theatre group made wondeful use of music to create a dramatic element, it did feel like drama-come-alive.The props and the set looked ingenious with the use of a doll’s house, swords, the box and Greeco-looking-pillars. If you have seen the film, “The Illusionist” casting Edward Norton, yesterday’s play may leave the film behind. Tricks like, when a doll is put in a box and a girl appears in it after the snap of a finger. One of the actor pull’sup a volunteer, puts her in a box, uses swords through the box, and lo, the girl appears on the other end of the auditorium, standing at the gate is unbelievable! The play is a story about a magician who wants to become someone and is in search of true magic. The backdrop of the story is magic but asks you not to give up even if something goes wrong. The actor also made one of the cast sit in the audience and waved at him making full use of the dramatic space. Such techniques blur the lines between the artist and the audience. For example, one of the character comes strutting behind from the other end in a stick. The use of soundtrack is just awesome. The stunts when the character puts a sword in his throat is surreal but real, it gave me goosebump while watching it. The playmakers want to leave the audience guessing about ” how to transport a man”. The group used a unique drama making process, after writing the plays a year and half back, the directors did not hold any audition but handpicked the actors after watching most plays of Puruhsottam Karandak and Firodiya Karandak.ou do not want to miss more of the featival and theatre group! The directors and script writers: Shriniwas Patwardhan, Soumitra Thorat