‘Ghosts’ bring Young Directors Festival to a close

Experimental take on Henrik Ibsen play couldn’t keep the audience engaged despite good performances

KARACHI:

During its two-week-long run, the National Academy of Performing Arts (Napa) Young Directors’ Festival has showcased some interesting and experimental productions. Continuing in the same tradition, the festival winded to a close with a performance that bordered more towards the experimental.

Kashif Hussain-directed movement drama Ghosts revolves around the residents of the Alving household. Separated from her husband since the birth of her son Oswald (Kashif Hussain), Mrs Alving (Muzaina Malik) has kept her marriage’s negative aspects hidden from everyone.

She comes to know that his son has been suffering from Syphillis, a disease he may have inherited from his father. Buried with guilt of having kept her son in the dark all these years, Mrs Alving soon discovers that Oswald has fallen in love with their maid, Regina Engstrand (Erum Bashir).But unbeknownst to both of them is that Regina is the illegitimate child of Captain Alving – making her Oswald’s half-sister.

‘Hatim Tai’ casts a spell on stage at NAPA Young Directors Festival



Despite having a compelling premise, the production was unable to offer the desired twists and turns which would have kept the audiences on the edge of their seat; a fact which was reflected in the slimming attendance post-interval.

For a performance described as a ‘movement’ play, it relied heavily on dialogue to take forward the narrative. According to Hussain, the use of dialogue was necessary, given that local audiences are not used to seeing such experimental productions.

“If I would have conducted the performance just as a movement play than the audience would have been lost. So, in order to connect different narratives and complex scenes within the play, it was important for me to use dialogues,” Hussain told The Express Tribune.

When bastions of culture join forces

While the dialogues when juxtaposed with the movements may have taken away some of the sheen from the performances, the entire cast did a commendable job.  Hussain, who had previously acted in two notable plays, Hatim Tai and Here Lies a Noble Man, seemed most comfortable in his role as the conflicted Oswald.

Prior experience and training in movement analysis allowed Hussain to get a little more adventurous with the play. While the original play, written by Henrik Ibsen, utilises the singular setting of a living room, the neatly-choreographed sequences allowed the director to move the play into different settings and delve into the subconscious of the characters.



The 80-minute-long play tackles a number of themes but the idea of confronting your demons was at the heart of it. “You can see how the lead character who has never met his father ended up inheriting his lifestyle and disease (Syphillis). Similarly, Mrs Alving who had sheltered her son from his father to protect him eventually ended up killing her son.”

When the enslaved is not servile

The cast for Ghosts also featured Farhan Alam, Hammad Khan, Masood Rehman, Ubaid Iqbal, Shabana Hasan, Najma Kifayat and Sehrish Qadri. It was followed by a prize distribution ceremony among the participants of the festival.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 2^nd,  2015.

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