KOCHI: Finally Kunjikkali, the maid in M T Vasudevan Nair’s national award-winning screenplay ‘Parinayam’, is opening her soul to the theatrical audience.
Offering a platform for Kunjikkali, who had been an intermediary between Smarthan, the religious juror, and Nangeli, the outcast Brahmin widow, is this year’s Soorya festival.
The play will be staged across the State as a part of this year’s Soorya Festival to be held in October.
While many female characters, though in marginal roles, are there in the original script, Kunjikkali is the only female character that appears on the stage in the theatrical version.
It is the pathetic plight of women still prevailing that forced Soorya Krishnamurthy, the director of the play, to go for a theatrical adaption.
“Kunjikkali, in the original script, had fascinated me a lot even when I saw the film for the first time. In the film she (the character portrayed by Sukumari) was destined to just echo the words uttered either by Smarthan or Nangeli,” Soorya Krishnamurthy said. “When I adapted it, I decided to let her open her mind. Belonging to the Sudra community, Kunjikkali enjoyed more freedom than Nangeli who was higher in the caste hierarchy. I felt that speaking on her own would be a journey to the world of womanhood. All changes were incorporated in consultation with M T Vasudevan Nair,” he said.
While the religious court led by Smarthan prosecutes Nangeli on charges of immoral acts, it is, in fact, womanhood that is being put in the dock. So Kunjikkali, who knows much about social life, is the apt person to comment on the issue, Krishnamurthy said.
Ammu, the common character in all the plays by Krishnamurthy, will appear at the tail-end of the drama and send the message from the director.