Performing Arts Festival: What the Dickens?

Three 25-minute performances mine Oliver Twist.

LAHORE:

“I am hoping that their passion for theatre has been re-ignited. I am hoping they will learn from this experience and will want to do more theatre work. And I am hopeful that this knowledge cascade formula continues and they go on and teach others about theatre and the various techniques and skills it uses,” said Ayesha Alam Khan of The Knowledge Factory about the directors and actors participating in the Dickens Performing Arts Festival which is currently being held the world over and one part of which was held at Alhamra on Saturday and Sunday.

Khan said she had approached the British Council about working with The Knowledge Factory. “They asked if we wanted to take up the Dickens Performing Arts Festival that was coming up.”

She said that the deal was that there would be a free workshop but then people in that workshop would train others. “That for me was the most exciting thing, this passing on of knowledge.”

“The first bunch was selected through auditions,” Khan said. In the second phase, she added, each group was responsible for choosing the kind of people they required. “For the initial group, our focus was on people who were serious about theatre and had a commitment to it.”

The three pieces performed on the weekend were each 25 minutes long. The first piece was co-directed by Omair Rana, Zainab Ahmed, Shehzad Sheikh and Hassan R Kazmi. “I loved to re-learn, it was great fun. They just told me that you have put up a production and pass the skill on,” said Rana recounting his experience at the workshop. Rana’s piece was set inside the Hall but did not employ the traditional space. The piece focused on the people Oliver Twist left behind in the workhouse. Rana asked the audience to think about the socially underprivileged and how they got there as we walked through the piece and our judgments about them. A young actor introduced herself as part of an NGO which was doing human rights work and walked the audience through the hall which was set up to look like a run down orphanage. The audience was accosted by orphans all of whom had lost some control on reality and were suffering from neglect. The actors interacted with the audience and at times questioned them.

Mira Hashmi, one of the directors, of the second piece talking about the initial workshop said, “It was a workshop that was specifically devised for younger performers or people who hadn’t really worked before.  But I think it worked just as well for some of us who have experience in the theatre.” Hashmi added that the experience “helped us chalk out workshop plans which were of great help. We found out what kinds of exercises to do with younger actors.”

“Owen Calvert Lyons from the Arcola Theatre group came down and trained us for three days. We then had to audition actors and do workshops with them on similar lines. Oliver Twist is our stimulus,” she added.

The piece co-directed by Hashmi, Meher Bano, Shah Fahad and Daniyal Naeem Dar had no dialogues and was ‘gothic inspired’. The actors mimed and danced. The setting was Sikes house where Fagin leaves Oliver and where he befriends Nancy and then the eventual murder of Nancy by Sikes. Meher Bano played Oliver.

“Mira did most of the work, I was just the lead actress,” said 17-year old Bano. “I have been doing theatre since I was 13. Directing has been challenging and getting the team together was not easy.” Bano admitted that “directing is not my cup of tea.”

16-year-old Aitchison student Mustafa Butt (one of the actors in Hashmi’s piece) said he found out about the auditions through Facebook. “We have been rehearsing for a month-and-a-half. This is my first play outside of school.”

Butt said, “Mime and movement have been challenging, coordinating with everyone else is the tough part. Our director told us that in plays when you see chaos, it’s all choreographed and that was the most challenging part of the whole thing.” Butt hopes to continue doing theatre, “it’s a lot of fun and a way to express yourself.”

The third and final piece follows ‘Olivia’ Twist being shown around town by the Artful Dodger. The piece co-directed by Asma Zaid and Karen David follows the people the Dodger introduces to the audience and explains how they got to this place.

“There is public funding for theatre at Alhamra but who is holding people accountable?” said Ayesha Alam Khan. Khan insisted that funding should be directed to people who are doing the work.

“This is not traditional theatre. We had to go through so much hassle to just perform. They could not understand why we were not booking the Halls and why we needed the outside space,” she said.

Khan said, “We want people in place who understand art forms which are not necessarily conventional. Those forms should also be given space.”

She added that there was an audience for this type of theatre. “Build it and they will come.”

Published in The Express Tribune, January 23^rd,  2012.