Bharat Rang Mahotsav
Encyclopedia
Bharat Rang Mahotsav (BRM), or the National Theatre Festival, established in 1999, is the annual theatre festival
of National School of Drama
(NSD), New Delhi
, India's premier theatre training institute of Govt. of India. Originally founded to show case, works of Indian theatre practitioners, over the year it has grown to attract international performers as well.
The 2009 Festival featured 63 productions, out of which 51 are from India and 12 are overseas plays, over a span of 12 days. Today it is acknowledged as the largest theatre festival of Asia
, dedicated solely to theatre
The festival is generally held during the second week of January each year at venues in and around NSD campus, and also in a one "showcase city", where a "Satellite Festival" of Bharat Rang Mahotsav is held. For example in 2009, the venue Lucknow
, saw 18 productions, in 2010 the venue was Bhopal.
's play Nagamandala (Hindi) directed by Amal Allana
. Held during the tenure Ram Gopal Bajaj
as NSD Director, the festival also featured Calcutta-based Nandikar
group's solo act Meghnad Badh Kavya (Bengali) written by Michael Madhusudan Dutta, Girish Karnad's Agni aur Barkha (Hindi) directed by Prasanna
, Ajneya's Uttar Priyadarshi (Manipuri) directed by Ratan Thiyam
and Himmat Mai (Hindi), an adaptation of Brecht
's Mother Courage
, and plays in several Indian languages, including Tamil, Malayalam, Assamese, Telugu, Kannada, Marathi, Punjabi, Dogri and Bhojpuri. A silent performance of Shakespeare's Othello, with only a few "sounds" in Arabic, directed by Teofik Jebali from Tunisia
was only foreign entry.
4th BRM: The 4th Bharat Rang Mahotsav, was inaugurated by Pandit Ravi Shankar on March 16, 2002, and featured 126 dramas in more than 20 languages, and plays from five other countries, including Korea, Bangladesh, Germany, Israel and Mauritius. The focus of the festival was on theatre from West Bengal
and the North East
, showcased in four productions from Manipur
, including Bhoot Amusung (Devil and the Mask) directed by L Dorendra, five from Assam with 'Hamlet' by Dulal Roy and nine plays from West Bengal. Nagaland
, showcased its dances, and Nidhali with young dancers under NSD graduate Rabijita Gogoi, as part of an NSD extension programme, finally Mizoram
presented Zanriah El Hmain by Siddharth Chakraborty. The plays were staged at eight venues in and around NSD, and the festival concluded on April 8, with Ratan Thiyam
’s presentation of Kalidasa
’s epic poem Ritusamharam.
7th BRM: Seventh Bharat Rang Mahotsav held January, 2005, in New Delhi, was marked by veteran theatre director, Mohan Maharishi
's breakthrough Hindi play, "Ho Rahega Kuch Na Kuch" inspired by Marsha Norman
's 1983 English play, "'Night, Mother
".
8th BRM: Eighth Bharat Rang Mahotsav (2006) showcased 60 plays from all over India, and also from Asia and the Arab world. A three-day international seminar titled "Theatre in Turmoil" was inaugurated by Richard Schechner
, a theatre scholar and director, participated by theatre directors, scholars, critics and designers from China, Japan, Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, South Korea and India.
9th BRM: Ninth Bharat Rang Mahotsav opened at Siri Fort Auditorium on on January 6, 2007 with a performance by Sasha Waltz
, the dancer-cum-choreographer from Germany, and featured the 52 performances, 13 from Australia, Bangladesh, China, Pakistan, Germany, Iran, Japan, South Korea, Nepal, Poland, Sri Lanka, Switzerland and Uzbekistan, and 39 Indian productions including tribute production, theatre director Alyque Padamsee
's play "Macbeth", and choreographer Narendra Sharma's "Mukhantar and Conference". The International dance theatre showcased works of Leszek Bzdyl, Beatrice Jaccard and Peter Schelling, also Indian dancers and choreographers like Maya Krishna Rao, Padmini Chettur
, Geeta Chandran and Veenapani Chawla. The "Satellite Festival" was held at Kolkata, from January 12 and 20.
10th BRM: In 2008, when NSD celebrated its golden jubilee the festival also saw a gathering of its alumni from all over the country, and from Bangladesh, Nepal and Mauritius. The festival was on January 3 inaugurated by Delhi Chief Minister, Sheila Dikshit
in the presence of theatre personality, Ebrahim Alkazi
at Kamani Auditorium, New Delhi. The opening performance was “Prologue”, the first part of Ratan Thiyam
’s “Manipur Trilogy” and in all the festival featured 76 productions, 57 from India and 19 from abroad stretched over 17 days. 26 productions also travelled to Mumbai
for the “Satellite Festival” organised, from January 6 to January 17, as it showcased plays of NSD graduates, including Ratan Thiyam’s Prologue, Bansi Kaul (Aranyadhipati Tantiya), Neelam Mansingh Chowdhury (The Suit), Sanjay Upadhyay (Harsingar), Baharul Islam (Akash), Mohan Maharishi (Dear Bapu)) and M K Raina (Stay Yet Awhile).
11th BRM: The 11th Bharat Rang Mahotsav, was inaugurated by Jawhar Sircar, Union Secretary for Culture, on January 7, 2009 at Kamani Auditorium, with theatre personality Zohra Sehgal
, as the guest of honour, and opened with the performance of the Marathi play “Awagha Rang Ekachi Zaala”. The festival focused on the productions by young directors, thus the included plays are collaborative works, based on texts, adaptations and also plays developed through training and workshops, in all it featured 65 plays, 51 from India and 13 international productions, played across 7 venues.
12th BRM: The 2010 Festival, featured close to 90 plays, including 13 international productions, and productions by theatre veterans, Ratan Thiyam's “When we Dead Awaken” and S. Ramanujam's “Veriattam”. The festival highlighted the role of music in theatre, through a segment titled Natya Naad, featuring trademark songs of various parts of India and of various theatre personalities, and performances based on the music in the works of B.V. Karanth, Bhaskar Chandavarkar
, K. N. Panikkar
and IPTA
music. It also included Parwaz, a puppet theatre group from Kabul
, Afghanistan
with 'The Wolf and the Goat' and 'The Hedgehog and the Rabbit', a troupe from Pakistan presenting the Urdu
version of Kalidas’s epic Sanskrit
play Shakuntala
, plus from Israel
, a clown show titled 'Odysseus Chaoticus'. In 2010, the "showcase city" was Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh
, where a nine-day theatre festival part of the Bharat Rang Mahotsav was inaugurated by the Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, showcasing 15 plays national and international plays in Bengali, Malayalam, Manipuri and Kannada as well as English, French and Nepali languages hosted at Ravindra Bhawan and Bharat Bhawan in Bhopal. With highlight being 'Umrao Jaan', 'Quick Death' and Ibsen's 'A Doll's House
' in Nepali, and “The Doorway,” performed by Jyoti Dogra, who also performed the play in Delhi Festival as well. Apart from the plays, the festival also hosted a tribute exhibition dedicated to life, works and theatre of B.V. Karanth and Habib Tanvir
.
13th BRM: The 2011 festival, showcased 82 plays from across the world, three photographic exhibitions, an Asia-Pacific theatre showcase and new media theatre, from Jan 7th to 22nd. The festival opened with an Assamese adaptation of Habib Tanvir
's Charandas Chor
directed by Anup Hazarika, a NSD graduate, and a special section on theatre personality Shyamanand Jalan
, other plays were Girish Karnad
's Bikhre Bimb, Dharamveer Bharti's Suraj ka Satwaan Ghoda and Henrik Ibsen
's Lady of the Sea (Sagar Kanya), Alexander Pushkin's Little Big Tragedies and Rabindranath Tagore
's Visarjan. 22 foreign productions from 20 countries were also part of the festival, this included Beaumarchais' opera The Barber of Seville, In Viva, a dance piece, a mime performance Silent Words, by Laurent Decol. From Latin America the festival featured Santa Maria de Iquique: Revenge of Ramon, a puppet performance from Pueta Peralta (Chile), En un Sol Amarillo (Bolivia) and Muare (Argentina). Apart from this two live (interactive) video theatre projects were new features in the festival, "The Garbage Project", about garbage problem in cities and "Social Gaming" on the impact of internet on human lives. The Contemporary dance theatre, section of festival had productions by Nora Amin from Egypt, Wendy Jehlen from the US and Min Tanaka and Aki Takahashi from Japan.
The festival was spread across eight venues in the Delhi, also travelled to Chennai Jan 11-19.
Theatre festival
Theatre festivals amongst the earliest types of festival. Classical Greek theatre was associated with religious festivals dedicated to Dionysus. The medieval mystery plays were presented at the major Christian feasts...
of National School of Drama
National School of Drama
National School of Drama is a theatre training institute situated at New Delhi, India, established . It is an autonomous organization under Ministry of Culture, Government of India. It was set up in 1959 by the Sangeet Natak Akademi, and became an independent school in 1975...
(NSD), New Delhi
New Delhi
New Delhi is the capital city of India. It serves as the centre of the Government of India and the Government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi. New Delhi is situated within the metropolis of Delhi. It is one of the nine districts of Delhi Union Territory. The total area of the city is...
, India's premier theatre training institute of Govt. of India. Originally founded to show case, works of Indian theatre practitioners, over the year it has grown to attract international performers as well.
The 2009 Festival featured 63 productions, out of which 51 are from India and 12 are overseas plays, over a span of 12 days. Today it is acknowledged as the largest theatre festival of Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...
, dedicated solely to theatre
The festival is generally held during the second week of January each year at venues in and around NSD campus, and also in a one "showcase city", where a "Satellite Festival" of Bharat Rang Mahotsav is held. For example in 2009, the venue Lucknow
Lucknow
Lucknow is the capital city of Uttar Pradesh in India. Lucknow is the administrative headquarters of Lucknow District and Lucknow Division....
, saw 18 productions, in 2010 the venue was Bhopal.
History
1st BRM: The first ever all-Indian theatre festival, Bharat Rang Mahotsav 1999, opened on 18 March in New Delhi, with staging of Girish KarnadGirish Karnad
Girish Raghunath Karnad is a contemporary writer, playwright, screenwriter, actor and movie director in Kannada language...
's play Nagamandala (Hindi) directed by Amal Allana
Amal Allana
Amal Allana is an Indian theatre director, scenic designer and costume designer and presently she is in her second consecutive term as the Chairperson of National School of Drama, India's premier institute of Theatre training, she also runs the Dramatic Art and Design Academy , New Delhi, with her...
. Held during the tenure Ram Gopal Bajaj
Ram Gopal Bajaj
Ram Gopal Bajaj is a noted Indian theatre director, academician, and a Hindi film actor. He has also been a faculty member and a former director of National School of Drama, New Delhi ....
as NSD Director, the festival also featured Calcutta-based Nandikar
Nandikar
Nandikar is a theatre group in India. The group has its headquarters in Kolkata in the state of West Bengal, but works around the world.__FORCETOC__-History:...
group's solo act Meghnad Badh Kavya (Bengali) written by Michael Madhusudan Dutta, Girish Karnad's Agni aur Barkha (Hindi) directed by Prasanna
Prasanna
Prasanna , is an Indian theatre director and playwright from Karnataka. He is one of the pioneers of modern Kannada theatre. He graduated from the National School of Drama . He founded Samudaya and gave a creative direction to Kannada theatre in the 1970's with other activists. Prasanna lives in...
, Ajneya's Uttar Priyadarshi (Manipuri) directed by Ratan Thiyam
Ratan Thiyam
Ratan Thiyam is an Indian playwright and theatre director, and the winner of Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 1987, one of leading figures of the "theatre of roots" movement in Indian theatre, which started in 1970s...
and Himmat Mai (Hindi), an adaptation of Brecht
Brecht
Brecht is a municipality located in the Belgian province of Antwerp. The municipality comprises the towns of Brecht proper, Sint-Job-in't-Goor and Sint-Lenaarts. On January 1, 2006 Brecht had a total population of 26,464...
's Mother Courage
Mother Courage
Mother Courage is a character from a Grimmelshausen novel Lebensbeschreibung der Ertzbetrügerin und Landstörtzerin Courasche dating from around 1670...
, and plays in several Indian languages, including Tamil, Malayalam, Assamese, Telugu, Kannada, Marathi, Punjabi, Dogri and Bhojpuri. A silent performance of Shakespeare's Othello, with only a few "sounds" in Arabic, directed by Teofik Jebali from Tunisia
Tunisia
Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...
was only foreign entry.
4th BRM: The 4th Bharat Rang Mahotsav, was inaugurated by Pandit Ravi Shankar on March 16, 2002, and featured 126 dramas in more than 20 languages, and plays from five other countries, including Korea, Bangladesh, Germany, Israel and Mauritius. The focus of the festival was on theatre from West Bengal
West Bengal
West Bengal is a state in the eastern region of India and is the nation's fourth-most populous. It is also the seventh-most populous sub-national entity in the world, with over 91 million inhabitants. A major agricultural producer, West Bengal is the sixth-largest contributor to India's GDP...
and the North East
North-East India
Northeast India refers to the easternmost region of India consisting of the contiguous Seven Sister States, Sikkim, and parts of North Bengal...
, showcased in four productions from Manipur
Manipur
Manipur is a state in northeastern India, with the city of Imphal as its capital. Manipur is bounded by the Indian states of Nagaland to the north, Mizoram to the south and Assam to the west; it also borders Burma to the east. It covers an area of...
, including Bhoot Amusung (Devil and the Mask) directed by L Dorendra, five from Assam with 'Hamlet' by Dulal Roy and nine plays from West Bengal. Nagaland
Nagaland
Nagaland is a state in the far north-eastern part of India. It borders the state of Assam to the west, Arunachal Pradesh and part of Assam to the north, Burma to the east and Manipur to the south. The state capital is Kohima, and the largest city is Dimapur...
, showcased its dances, and Nidhali with young dancers under NSD graduate Rabijita Gogoi, as part of an NSD extension programme, finally Mizoram
Mizoram
Mizoram is one of the Seven Sister States in North Eastern India, sharing borders with the states of Tripura, Assam, Manipur and with the neighbouring countries of Bangladesh and Burma. Mizoram became the 23rd state of India on 20 February 1987. Its capital is Aizawl. Mizoram is located in the...
presented Zanriah El Hmain by Siddharth Chakraborty. The plays were staged at eight venues in and around NSD, and the festival concluded on April 8, with Ratan Thiyam
Ratan Thiyam
Ratan Thiyam is an Indian playwright and theatre director, and the winner of Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 1987, one of leading figures of the "theatre of roots" movement in Indian theatre, which started in 1970s...
’s presentation of Kalidasa
Kalidasa
Kālidāsa was a renowned Classical Sanskrit writer, widely regarded as the greatest poet and dramatist in the Sanskrit language...
’s epic poem Ritusamharam.
7th BRM: Seventh Bharat Rang Mahotsav held January, 2005, in New Delhi, was marked by veteran theatre director, Mohan Maharishi
Mohan Maharishi
Mohan Maharishi is an Indian theatre director, actor and a playwright. He was awarded the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award for 'Direction' in 1992.-Early life:...
's breakthrough Hindi play, "Ho Rahega Kuch Na Kuch" inspired by Marsha Norman
Marsha Norman
Marsha Norman is an American playwright, screenwriter, and novelist. She received the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for her play night, Mother...
's 1983 English play, "'Night, Mother
'night, Mother
'Night, Mother is a 1983 play by Marsha Norman about a daughter, Jessie, and her mother, Thelma . The play opens with Jessie calmly telling Mama that by morning she will be dead, as she plans to commit suicide that very evening...
".
8th BRM: Eighth Bharat Rang Mahotsav (2006) showcased 60 plays from all over India, and also from Asia and the Arab world. A three-day international seminar titled "Theatre in Turmoil" was inaugurated by Richard Schechner
Richard Schechner
Richard Schechner is Professor of Performance Studies at the Tisch School of the Arts, New York University , editor of TDR: The Drama Review, and artistic director of East Coast Artists. His BA is from Cornell University , MA from the University of Iowa , and PhD from Tulane University...
, a theatre scholar and director, participated by theatre directors, scholars, critics and designers from China, Japan, Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, South Korea and India.
9th BRM: Ninth Bharat Rang Mahotsav opened at Siri Fort Auditorium on on January 6, 2007 with a performance by Sasha Waltz
Sasha Waltz
Sasha Alexandra Waltz is a German choreographer, dancer and leader of the dance company Sasha Waltz and Guests.- Biography :...
, the dancer-cum-choreographer from Germany, and featured the 52 performances, 13 from Australia, Bangladesh, China, Pakistan, Germany, Iran, Japan, South Korea, Nepal, Poland, Sri Lanka, Switzerland and Uzbekistan, and 39 Indian productions including tribute production, theatre director Alyque Padamsee
Alyque Padamsee
Alyque Padamsee is an Indian theater personality and ad film maker. He is probably best known in the English-speaking world for playing Muhammad Ali Jinnah in the film Gandhi...
's play "Macbeth", and choreographer Narendra Sharma's "Mukhantar and Conference". The International dance theatre showcased works of Leszek Bzdyl, Beatrice Jaccard and Peter Schelling, also Indian dancers and choreographers like Maya Krishna Rao, Padmini Chettur
Padmini Chettur
Padmini Chettur is an Indian contemporary dancer, trained by dancer-choreographer Chandralekha. She runs her own dance company based in Chennai, India, "Padmini Chettur Dance Company".-Early life and education:...
, Geeta Chandran and Veenapani Chawla. The "Satellite Festival" was held at Kolkata, from January 12 and 20.
10th BRM: In 2008, when NSD celebrated its golden jubilee the festival also saw a gathering of its alumni from all over the country, and from Bangladesh, Nepal and Mauritius. The festival was on January 3 inaugurated by Delhi Chief Minister, Sheila Dikshit
Sheila Dikshit
Sheila Dikshit is the Chief Minister of Delhi. She is from the Indian National Congress. Dikshit was sworn in as the Chief Minister for a third consecutive term of the Government of Delhi state in January 2009 after pulling a victory in November 2008 state elections...
in the presence of theatre personality, Ebrahim Alkazi
Ebrahim Alkazi
Ebrahim Alkazi is one of the most influential Indian theatre directors and Drama teachers in 20th century Indian theatre. He also remained the Director of National School of Drama, New Delhi He has also been a noted art connoisseur, collector and gallery owner, and found Art Heritage Gallery in...
at Kamani Auditorium, New Delhi. The opening performance was “Prologue”, the first part of Ratan Thiyam
Ratan Thiyam
Ratan Thiyam is an Indian playwright and theatre director, and the winner of Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 1987, one of leading figures of the "theatre of roots" movement in Indian theatre, which started in 1970s...
’s “Manipur Trilogy” and in all the festival featured 76 productions, 57 from India and 19 from abroad stretched over 17 days. 26 productions also travelled to Mumbai
Mumbai
Mumbai , formerly known as Bombay in English, is the capital of the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is the most populous city in India, and the fourth most populous city in the world, with a total metropolitan area population of approximately 20.5 million...
for the “Satellite Festival” organised, from January 6 to January 17, as it showcased plays of NSD graduates, including Ratan Thiyam’s Prologue, Bansi Kaul (Aranyadhipati Tantiya), Neelam Mansingh Chowdhury (The Suit), Sanjay Upadhyay (Harsingar), Baharul Islam (Akash), Mohan Maharishi (Dear Bapu)) and M K Raina (Stay Yet Awhile).
11th BRM: The 11th Bharat Rang Mahotsav, was inaugurated by Jawhar Sircar, Union Secretary for Culture, on January 7, 2009 at Kamani Auditorium, with theatre personality Zohra Sehgal
Zohra Sehgal
Zohra Segal is an Indian stage and film actress, who started her career as dancer with dancer Uday Shankar in 1935 and worked with him for the next eight years. She has appeared in many Bollywood films as well as English language films and television series...
, as the guest of honour, and opened with the performance of the Marathi play “Awagha Rang Ekachi Zaala”. The festival focused on the productions by young directors, thus the included plays are collaborative works, based on texts, adaptations and also plays developed through training and workshops, in all it featured 65 plays, 51 from India and 13 international productions, played across 7 venues.
12th BRM: The 2010 Festival, featured close to 90 plays, including 13 international productions, and productions by theatre veterans, Ratan Thiyam's “When we Dead Awaken” and S. Ramanujam's “Veriattam”. The festival highlighted the role of music in theatre, through a segment titled Natya Naad, featuring trademark songs of various parts of India and of various theatre personalities, and performances based on the music in the works of B.V. Karanth, Bhaskar Chandavarkar
Bhaskar Chandavarkar
Bhaskar Chandavarkar was an Indian sitar player, academic and film and theatre composer who worked with directors of Indian cinema, in various languages including Marathi, Hindi, Kannada and Malayalam, Mrinal Sen, Girish Karnad, Aparna Sen and Amol Palekar and was known for his blending of Indian...
, K. N. Panikkar
K. N. Panikkar
K. N. Panikkar is an Indian historian, associated with the "Marxist school" of historiography.Panikkar was Professor of Modern Indian History at the Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University . Prior to joining JNU, he taught at University of Delhi. In 2001, he was appointed as the...
and IPTA
Ipta
IPTA can refer to:* Indian People's Theatre Association* International Pulsar Timing Array...
music. It also included Parwaz, a puppet theatre group from Kabul
Kabul
Kabul , spelt Caubul in some classic literatures, is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. It is also the capital of the Kabul Province, located in the eastern section of Afghanistan...
, Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...
with 'The Wolf and the Goat' and 'The Hedgehog and the Rabbit', a troupe from Pakistan presenting the Urdu
Urdu
Urdu is a register of the Hindustani language that is identified with Muslims in South Asia. It belongs to the Indo-European family. Urdu is the national language and lingua franca of Pakistan. It is also widely spoken in some regions of India, where it is one of the 22 scheduled languages and an...
version of Kalidas’s epic Sanskrit
Sanskrit
Sanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.Buddhism: besides Pali, see Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand...
play Shakuntala
Abhijñānaśākuntalam
Abhijñānashākuntala or Abhijñānaśākuntalam) , is a well-known Sanskrit play by Kālidāsa. Its date is uncertain, but Kalidasa is often placed in the period between the 1st century BCE and 4th century CE....
, plus from Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
, a clown show titled 'Odysseus Chaoticus'. In 2010, the "showcase city" was Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh
Madhya Pradesh
Madhya Pradesh , often called the Heart of India, is a state in central India. Its capital is Bhopal and Indore is the largest city....
, where a nine-day theatre festival part of the Bharat Rang Mahotsav was inaugurated by the Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, showcasing 15 plays national and international plays in Bengali, Malayalam, Manipuri and Kannada as well as English, French and Nepali languages hosted at Ravindra Bhawan and Bharat Bhawan in Bhopal. With highlight being 'Umrao Jaan', 'Quick Death' and Ibsen's 'A Doll's House
A Doll's House
A Doll's House is a three-act play in prose by the Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. It premièred at the Royal Theatre in Copenhagen, Denmark, on 21 December 1879, having been published earlier that month....
' in Nepali, and “The Doorway,” performed by Jyoti Dogra, who also performed the play in Delhi Festival as well. Apart from the plays, the festival also hosted a tribute exhibition dedicated to life, works and theatre of B.V. Karanth and Habib Tanvir
Habib Tanvir
Habib Tanvir was one of the most popular Indian Urdu, Hindi playwrights, a theatre director, poet and actor. He is the writer of plays such as, Agra Bazar and Charandas Chor...
.
13th BRM: The 2011 festival, showcased 82 plays from across the world, three photographic exhibitions, an Asia-Pacific theatre showcase and new media theatre, from Jan 7th to 22nd. The festival opened with an Assamese adaptation of Habib Tanvir
Habib Tanvir
Habib Tanvir was one of the most popular Indian Urdu, Hindi playwrights, a theatre director, poet and actor. He is the writer of plays such as, Agra Bazar and Charandas Chor...
's Charandas Chor
Charandas Chor
Charandas Chor is 1975 children's film made by noted director Shyam Benegal, based on the famous play by Habib Tanvir, which itself was an adaptation of a classical Rajasthani folktale by Vijaydan Detha...
directed by Anup Hazarika, a NSD graduate, and a special section on theatre personality Shyamanand Jalan
Shyamanand Jalan
Shyamanand Jalan was an influential Kolkata-based Indian thespian, theatre director, and actor. He is credited for the renaissance period of modern Indian theatre and especially the Hindi theatre in Kolkata from the 1960s to 1980s...
, other plays were Girish Karnad
Girish Karnad
Girish Raghunath Karnad is a contemporary writer, playwright, screenwriter, actor and movie director in Kannada language...
's Bikhre Bimb, Dharamveer Bharti's Suraj ka Satwaan Ghoda and Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Ibsen was a major 19th-century Norwegian playwright, theatre director, and poet. He is often referred to as "the father of prose drama" and is one of the founders of Modernism in the theatre...
's Lady of the Sea (Sagar Kanya), Alexander Pushkin's Little Big Tragedies and Rabindranath Tagore
Rabindranath Tagore
Rabindranath Tagore , sobriquet Gurudev, was a Bengali polymath who reshaped his region's literature and music. Author of Gitanjali and its "profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse", he became the first non-European Nobel laureate by earning the 1913 Prize in Literature...
's Visarjan. 22 foreign productions from 20 countries were also part of the festival, this included Beaumarchais' opera The Barber of Seville, In Viva, a dance piece, a mime performance Silent Words, by Laurent Decol. From Latin America the festival featured Santa Maria de Iquique: Revenge of Ramon, a puppet performance from Pueta Peralta (Chile), En un Sol Amarillo (Bolivia) and Muare (Argentina). Apart from this two live (interactive) video theatre projects were new features in the festival, "The Garbage Project", about garbage problem in cities and "Social Gaming" on the impact of internet on human lives. The Contemporary dance theatre, section of festival had productions by Nora Amin from Egypt, Wendy Jehlen from the US and Min Tanaka and Aki Takahashi from Japan.
The festival was spread across eight venues in the Delhi, also travelled to Chennai Jan 11-19.
Venue
Most of the plays during three weeks of the festival, are held at various theatre spaces within the NSD campus, including, Sanmukh, Abhimanch, Bahumukh and Meghdoot Open Air theatre at neighbouring Ravindra Kala Bhawan. Some plays are also held in city's large auditoriums like Kamani Auditorium, Shri Ram Centre and LTG auditorium.External links
- Bharat Rang Mahotsav, Official website
- Official website of the NSD
- East is ready to meet West again … on its own terms The ScotsmanThe ScotsmanThe Scotsman is a British newspaper, published in Edinburgh.As of August 2011 it had an audited circulation of 38,423, down from about 100,000 in the 1980s....