Haven’t we all been asked about how we met our partners? For every love story this remains the most common question and so the story of Shree Raghava, a Hindi stage production at Akshara Theatre, revolves around the two characters Shree and Raghav, and how they first met each other and the journey they together went on post their marriage.
“The play is a slice of life, a love story to be precise, somewhere inspired from real-life incidents. The story transpires around a journey of six years, three before marriage and three after, showcasing the transitions the two protagonists go through and how the dynamics of the relation changes with time. So, questions of how things change between them are catered through the narrative,” says Rajneesh Gautam, who along with Swati has written, directed and will be performing the play. The duo has been together for three years and had for some time wanted to weave a story around their life. This led to them picking out stories from their life and putting them together on the stage.
“One such interesting story is how when anyone asks us about the time we met, we both end up having two different stories. So, both our stories projected how one was after the other and who proposed whom, thus coming up with different narratives while sitting right next to each other. In the play, we are answering the question of how the two characters met each other, the same we way we do in reality with a little dramatisation,” says Rajneesh.
“We had a lot of discussions on which stories we need to put in the story. While some stories were close to us, others were something that we observed in relationships of other people,” adds Swati, who found the process of filtering out stories to that have become a part of the play. Currently, in their real life, their story is at a point when the play comes to an intermission, the other half of the play is created by imagination, weaved through the conflicts they have right now. “For example, Swati who plays Shree is six years younger to me and this age gap creates a little problem. This has been borrowed from our life and reimagined in the next three years of the marriage depicted in the play,” adds Rajneesh.
Unlike their previous plays, The Curse of Hamlet, Qaidi and Shadow, Shree Raghava is a shift to towards a lighthearted drama. “The last three plays we worked on were really dark and the process was really intense and the aura, serious. In contrast, we usually discuss the idea of the play and how to take things further, the process is fun and relaxing. While there are certain serious aspects in this play as well but having confronted them in our real lives already, it has become easy,” say Rajneesh. Adding, to it Swati says that Shree Raghava was one of the most fun plays. “The play having been designed based on our lives is something very close to us.”
In a nutshell
Shree Raghava, a Hindi stage production at Akshara Theatre, revolves around the two characters Shree and Raghav, and how they first met each other and the journey they together went on post their marriage.
Play name: Shree Raghav
Language: Hindi/English
Duration: 45-50 minutes
Venue: Akshara Theatre
Date: February 23, 5:00pm