Gujarati language theatre includes some of India’s most successful vernacular language drama companies. “However, Gujarati theatre is almost entirely based in Mumbai with most of its top directors and artistes based there,” says Chintan Pandya, the Cultural Coordinator of Alliance Française d’Ahmedabad. “A group of like-minded people feel Ahmedabad needs to develop as a theatre centre. This led to our starting the Fanatika Theatre Club in 2010,” he adds.
Pandya, who has been acting in plays and TV series since childhood, is a postgraduate in arts, design and communication from the prestigious CEPT University in Ahmedabad. He has attended workshops at the Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London. Pandya wrote Just Divorced, a psychoanalytical experimental play in English, has been assisting several Gujarati play directors, and has been involved with Mallika Sarabhai’s Darpana productions.
“To revive the theatre culture in Gujarat, we decided to invite people who want to pursue theatre during their free time or as a vocation to become members. The idea was to give a comprehensive insight into theatre, covering artistic and technical details,’’ says Pandya. The club attracted much enthusiasm. In February, the first ‘Fanatika Theatre Festival’ gave young and amateur actors their first public appearance. “This festival staged two plays which were very well received by the audience and media—French playwright Jean Genet’s Les Bonnes (English: The Maids) translated in Gujarati as Antaraal by prominent theatre personality Hasmukh Baradi, and Molière’s classic Le Malade Imaginaire translated in English by Charles Heron Wall as The Imaginary Invalid. We did our second theatre festival in August,’’ says Pandya. Fanatika got the support of the Gujarati Sahitya Parishad. Its campus has become a place for the club’s meetings, workshops and rehearsals. “We have looked beyond just organising plays to more detailing about theatre as an art form that presents the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place using live performers, supported by stagecraft and design,” says Pandya, elaborating, “our workshops have included sessions on ‘Improvisation in Acting’ by National School of Drama, Paris-trained actor, writer and director Julien Mulot; ‘The Importance and Aspects of Lights in Theatre’ by Bernard Marescot, a film and theatre producer with specialisation in light design; Elsa Bourdin’s ‘Costume Design for Theatre’, and Cassandre Boy’s ‘Set Design for Theatre’. Some of these were international workshops with certificates for participants’’. Fanatika also did a workshop ‘Salsa’, about the use of dance in theatre conducted by dancer Ravina Dave. Mahatma Gandhi International School founder-director Anju Musafir Chazot conducted a workshop on Commedia dell’arte, an Italian theatre form using masks.
The Fanatika team feels that the renovation of Jaishankar Sundari Hall has given a boost to the theatre scene in Ahmedabad. “On October 8, Fanatika Theatre Club organised Lady Lalkunwar, based on the script of poet-playwright Padmashri Sitanshu Yashascha, that went off very well to a large audience.”
The Fanatika team is now upbeat about the club’s future. “We are planning to invite international theatre professionals for a workshop in December and will present another production in January next year,” says Pandya.
