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The reel and the real

Natya Chetana members recalled the growth of their group through a play.

How would it look if the 22-year-old history of a theatre organisation could be narrated in a play format? And how exciting would it be if the audience be made a part of it? One of Orissa’s progressive and professional theatre group – Nat ya Chetana – founded and led by Subodh Patnaik, devised this unique format to tell the story of the theatre organisation, during the 22nd anniversary celebration of the group in Bhubaneswar.

Known for his innovations, Subodh invited the theatre community and connoisseurs to an informal gathering at a community hall. A portion of the hall was decorated as the drawing room of the Natya Chetana office where six scenes were enacted.

While the first scene was a conversation between eminent actor Sarat Pujari and dramatist Gopal Patnaik on how Natya Chetana has evolved over the years, the next scene revealed how ‘Rebati’, a woman-centric popular play directed by Baby, its troupe member and the lone professional woman theatre director of Orissa, was not included in a recent theatre festival.

Scene 5 was exciting with two theatre activists from London and Brazil narrating to a young theatre director of Orissa about their meeting with Natya Chetana troupe abroad and their subsequent trip to India to spend some time with the troupe.

The concluding scene saw the members unfolding a banner before their director for approval that read “22nd anniversary celebration of Natya Chetana,” which is to be displayed at the exhibition of photographs showing two decades of the troupe’s activities. The drama in real life ended here and the inauguration of the photo exhibition followed.