During a scene in the play Urmila, the audience spontaneously leans forward and starts clapping spontaneously. The titular character is saying, “It’s not like I wanted to live my life” when she thinks of her husband Lakshmana, who abandoned her for 14 years and left her to sleep for the entire time. Urmila resolutely calls out his refusal to give her a choice. The audience’s applause acknowledges not only the intensity of her emotion but also the universal struggle for autonomy and self-determination of women the role embodies.
The play is directed and written by Nimmy Raphel who plays the lead, and presented by the Adishakti Theatre group; it was performed during the Manan Theater Festival in Hyderabad. It offers a poignant, layered exploration of gender dynamics and personal agency, with Urmila from the Ramayana as its focal point. It revisits the age-old trope of patriarchy in mythology, questioning and subverting traditional notions of devotion, sacrifice, and obedience often associated with women in societies old and new. In, Urmila there are only three characters—she and two sleep demons who sit on her eyelids. With few dialogues, the 60-minute tour de force relies on the static electricity generated by the actors.
How does an epic, written centuries ago stay still applicable with themes of equality and consent? “Stories are stories and talk about reflective moments that are always pertinent. I see them as tales of human emotions—which were complex then and remain complex now,” says Raphel. Urmila explores the intricate dynamics of human decisions. Lakshmana orders Urmila to “Sleep, my sleep”, which becomes a powerful metaphor for control. The play is a journey of defiance, as Urmila challenges the social glorification of silent sacrifice.
With a sparse set and strategically designed lighting, the atmosphere is intimate, drawing the audience closer to Urmila’s internal struggle. A terminal moment in the play, assisted by actors Vinay Kumar, and Sooraj S, is when the three actors tussle—Urmila, in an effort to wake herself from endless sleep, and the others trying to lull her back into slumber. Even when she walks, Raphel moves in a dream state, her steps disconnected from the world around her, as if bound by the constraints of imposed slumber. This somnambulistic quality showcases the depth of Urmila’s conflict within. “Urmila is a lived experience, and the movements are an organic manner of depicting the struggle,” she says.
Urmila’s story is the tale of many women who are compelled to obey decisions made by others without asking her opinion, justified using the pretext of tradition or familial obligation. Throughout history, the human body has functioned as a metaphor for social protests. When traditional avenues for negotiation fail, individuals have resorted to their own bodies as a last resort to resist oppressive norms; especially women. This play does the same—it implores the audience to rethink deeply entrenched norms of gender, acceptance, and freedom. The play wil now travel to Arunachal Pradesh seeking a newer audience. In the mountains or the plains, the gender theatre of choice resounds with epic struggles.