BENGALURU:The intimate portrait of a love affair between Prince Siegfried and Odette, a princess turned into a swan by an evil sorceress, is being adapted for the Indian audiences by Sharmila Mukherjee through an ensemble of 25 dancers. Called Hansika, the performance will be staged on March 31 at Chowdiah Memorial Hall.
Here's an excerpt of a conversation we had with her:
What made you take up such a project?
I've grown up seeing Swan Lake and other similar works. I thought it was very suitable to Odissi because of the fluidity and the movements. I always imagined that I would do it. Having done quite a few productions, I have gained enough experience to carry out this production. This project requires a lot of dancers. I decided to train dancers from my school and go ahead with this production.
Did your training in ballet play a part creating Hansika?
Yes I learnt ballet from Uday Shankar's disciples and I have an idea of how to go about it. I have participated in both small and lead roles in a lot of ballet performances. That helped me a lot.
Some challenges you faced?
It was difficult in terms of adapting the story. There are many versions - with a tragic ending, a happy ending, with two swans. I had to chose something that would suit the Indian sensibilities. There are many male dancers in the original version. I decided to make it female centric. That was a bit of a challenge. I had to work with a big cast and train many dancers.
Tell us more about this performance?
It's a one-hour ballet and has a lot of emotions to it. It's a love story so there is a lot of jealousy, greed, love, passion and negativity. There is also a subtle message we are giving at the end, on lakes. I don't want to give away too much... I don't want to make it too complicated for the audience to understand. Because after all it is a dance, so you have to keep the story line simple, you have to keep the emotions bare, raw and very simple. And at the same time make it appealing; I hope I will be able to do that.
Where do you plan to perform Hansika?
Right now we are going to perform in Bengaluru. Other other cities have also showed interest. So we plan to travel with the cast. We even plan to perform abroad. But we might have to cut down on the cast when we travel.