PERFORMING SHAKESPEARE

A THEATRE group in American College, Fourth Wall, performed Shakespeare's `A Midsummer Night's Dream' this week(11.10.2004). The very attempt to handle a full-length Shakespearean play is laudable because most amateur groups steer clear of the bard.

Fancy dress


Many years ago, Prof. Frederick Jacob (FJ) used to get students together to enact a few scenes from Shakespeare. FJ never bothered about acting, stage movement, stance or gesture. He was only particular about the words being pronounced correctly or rather as he himself did. So we had actors rooted to one spot, spouting Elizabethan verse. It wasn't a dramatic performance.

FJ was lavish in spending on costumes. On one occasion, I accompanied him with two other students to a well known cloth shop. FJ fixed his gaze on a salesman and asked in his English-accented Tamil, "Ingu arasanukkuriya udaigal kidaikkuma?" (Do you have clothes fit for a king?) We explained to the bewildered salesman that the cloth was needed for stage costumes. Where upon he produced several piles of satin and velvet.

FJ selected the shiniest and the most colourful, without bothering about authenticity. A nearby tailor who couldn't tell Shakespeare from Shesappa Iyer, "designed" the costumes, which were more suited for fancy dress contests than stage drama. Caesar and Antony would never have dreamt of being seen in such gaudy garb.

Boy actors


In Shakespeare's time women never acted on stage. Only boys played the female roles. This enabled Shakespeare to use the plot device of the heroine disguising herself as a boy when necessary. `As You Like It', `Twelfth Night' and `The Merchant of Venice' had such scenes, which depended very much on boys playing female roles. Later when these plays were made into Hollywood films, it was ensured that slim and boyish looking heroines like Katherine Hepburn did the roles.

Some old Tamil films were based on Shakespeare's plays. But they didn't bother about the boyish element required in the heroines. In "Kanniyin Kathali", based on Twelfth Night, the role of Viola was played by the buxom Madhuri Devi. However much they tried to disguise her as a boy, it was quite obvious that she was not, thus making `willing suspension of disbelief ' rather difficult. When she was addressed by a character as "Thambi", the whole audience burst out laughing. Kanniyin Kathali turned out to be a hilarious comedy, but not for the right reasons.

In my college days, just as in Shakespeare's time, girls never came forward to act. Boys played the female roles. So we had the advantage of being believable in the disguise scenes. But there were other problems that we had to face, particularly with one boy actor.

Desdemona lives


A friend of mine wished to do the bedchamber scene in Othello, where the hero murders his wife, Desdemona. A boy was selected to play Desdemona. He was a good-looking chap, and when made-up looked very cute, indeed as a girl.

All went well until the final part of the scene. The hero strangled the heroine in spite of her pathetic pleas, and after she `died', he came forward to the front of the stage emoting effectively to express anguish and despair, aided by Shakespeare's gripping lines. Suddenly the audience started giggling and then burst into guffaws. `Othello' had thought he was doing quite well, and so he was puzzled by the audience reaction. He shot a glance backward to find the dead Desdemona standing up and doing `Vanakkam' to the audience.

The boy seemed to have thought that since his role was over, there was no point lying there playing dead. He thought he could take his bow, and retire backstage.

After the curtain came down, we had a tough time keeping the stage Othello from really killing his Desdemona.


The reluctant wrestler


Once in the 50's, a group of actors decided to put up `As You Like It' in the palmyra grove in Hakim Ajmal Khan Road, opposite to the road leading to OCPM School. A small platform was erected and the audience sat on the ground on three sides of the stage. A well known hockey player, Woolridge, played Orlando. Miss. Leela Barnabas played Rosalind, and a popular local beauty, Janaki Menon, played Celia. They had made a senior professor play Charles, the king's wrestler. This professor who was noted for his girth around the middle, simply refused to wrestle. So the scene was devised thus: Orlando and the obese professor hold each other and gently walk out crabwise. Then the professor comes back and lies down, while Orlando stands near him. The audience has to imagine that there had been a wrestling bout, and Orlando had thrown the professor to the ground. But the audience was so busy laughing that it couldn't exercise its imagination.

On such occasions, if you hear a dull, rumbling sound, it could be Shakespeare turning over in his grave.