22 September,2016 09:02 AM IST | | Dipanjan Sinha
A seminar looks at the evolving ways of acting training in India
Miss Julie by August Strindberg, Dir. E. Alkazi, Alaknanda Samarth as Miss Julie, E. Alkazi as Jean, Theatre Unit, Bombay, 1960
"The actor now can hardly be just called an actor anymore. He is a performer," says Zuleikha Chaudhuri, who will be conducting the seminar, Collecting Practices 1, as a part of the exhibition, "The Theatre of E. Alkazi, currently on at the NGMA. " The seminar traces how people have developed the methods of creating a performance over the years," she says.
The Theatre Archive at the Alkazi Foundation for the Arts has been initiated recently on the occasion of the 90th birthday of theatre exponent E Alkazi. The one-day seminar that explores acting methodologies will be divided into two sessions. The first session will be attended by actors Kusum Haider, Rohini Hattangadi and Joy Sengupta, who will talk about their experience of working with Alkazi, who focused on a lot on the training of an actor.
Shivaram Karanth rehearsing with Rohini Hattangadi and Raj Babbar for Bhishma Vijay play Yakshagana. Pics courtesy/Alkazi Foundation for the Arts
The second session will be with practitioners who will discuss how the processes of training as an actor have evolved over the years. "In this session, we will look at the contemporary training methods. The way the actor now is more of a collaborator," Chaudhuri says. This session will be attended by Vinay Kumar (artistic director & performer, Adishakti, Pondicherry), Abhilash Pillai (theatre director, New Delhi), Jehan Manekshaw (co-convener, The Drama School Mumbai) and Neel Chaudhuri (artistic director of The Tadpole Repertory, New Delhi). Chaudhuri says that in this session they will also discuss new methods like special exercises for actors and the use of videos.
