Remember the haunting sound of the been that announced the arrival of a snake in numerous films or in the words of TV, a naagin? Once confined to this image, the instrument is now taking on a dramatically different role in theatre director roysten Abel’s next. A 100 Charmers, which comes to the city this Sunday, gathers a 100-member ensemble of snake charmers, transforming the been into a powerful collective act. The idea took root when Bahar Dutt, who runs the NGO Friends of Snakes, approached Abel to create a production with snake charmers whose livelihoods had been upended after stricter enforcement of wildlife protection laws prohibited performances with snakes. “I wanted to hear what a hundred beens would sound like together,” Abel recalls.
The inspiration for A 100 Charmers came while attending the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in Scotland, where he remembers arriving before dawn and hearing bagpipes echo across the city.
At the time of the making, the vision seemed unrealistic. Abel initially found only about 25-30 snake charmers in a Delhi village who still played the instrument. Even so, he named the production A 100 Charmers. The organisers asked how many performers the production had. “I told them I had a hundred. They gave us funding, and the full ensemble came together,” he shares, adding that sometimes one has to imagine something before it even exists. Today, the ensemble includes snake charmers from Delhi, Haryana, Rajasthan, Chandigarh and Uttar Pradesh.
Turning the vision into reality came with its own challenges. most members of the ensemble had never performed in a theatre production. “It was like getting children to perform in a play for the first time. They were excited, but sceptical. They probably thought I was a madman who would eventually fail,” he laughs, adding that the team worked together to develop the music, structure and performance. Almost soon, the scepticism faded the moment the performers heard the full ensemble play together.
Abel, however, insists the work is not an exercise in cultural preservation. “I don’t think they need patronising, they just need a good audience who would listen to their music. What draws me is that I see something raw and magical in them. If people come and experience this, that’s already meaningful. Whatever they carry afterwards is simply a bonus,” he says.
(A 100 Charmers will be performed at the Prestige Centre for Performing Arts, Konanakunte, on July 26. Tickets on bookmyshow.com)