Feisal Alkazi is back at it again. Coming to the stage after three decades at Delhi’s Triveni Kala Sangam, the theatre veteran’s play Effie’s Burning, written by British playwright Valerie Windsor, unfolds through layers of trauma concealed under a dense blanket of forgetting. Classified as a ‘moral defective’ in her teenage years, Effie Palmer, a 64-year-old woman with a mental disability, carries within herself the trauma of being sexually abused and sent to a mental institution by her parents, being deemed unfit to exist in society.
Alkazi, also an educationist and activist, says, “Making a case for deinstitutionalisation, the play offers a chance to think about what happens to people who were categorised based on their behaviour and ostracised from society.” He, along with the actors Paro Anand and Radhika Alkazi, has worked in the field of disability for the last four decades. “So, we are naturally sensitive to trauma. What came almost instinctively was to refrain from sentimentality, sensationalisation, and stereotyping.”
There are no direct claims in the play; only gestures. The narrative is surrendered to the imagination and the perception of the audience, which is its extraordinary power. The director says, “The more you leave unsaid, the more powerfully people visualise it. The violence endured by Effie is not shown on stage, since we wanted the audience to visualise for themselves. A verbal expression of trauma by the protagonist creates a mental image, and it is not necessary to act it out. The implication is enough for the audience to imagine something much worse than we could ever show on stage, and this can be more effective than any enactment.”
Alkazi refuses to portray overstated, explicit, and graphic violence. “After a point, such a portrayal ceases to be reality and is a staged artificial accentuation. I am very cautious of how I portray violence,” he says.
Female solidarity, inspiration, and empowerment find space in the play as Effie and her Bangladeshi doctor, Dr Fatima Ali, forge a bond over their lived experiences of patriarchy.
Allkazi reflects that, as it is a classic script which required classic handling instead of a contemporary twist, the play has not changed from its last show in 1992. The only change has been in the doctor’s character who is a Polish refugee woman in Windsor’s text but a Bangladeshi woman here for better relatability to her social position amongst the Indian audience. “The experience of building the play with the same actors who are 34 years older now made it rich,” he adds.
Today, what anchors the play are contemporary times, when audiences are open to understanding mental health. The director says, “The play wants people to think over the problem with behaving differently. Perhaps the behaviour is not at fault here, social judgement is.”