Charandas Chor, a journey within - Part 1

The journey of Charandas Chor for me, started exactly a week before I appeared for the most crucial exam of my life. It started on a day when Cyclone Lusi hit Auckland.  As I look back at all of it now, it surprises me that I was thinking about not going for the auditions. I would have missed out, missed out on so much - new friends and new experiences. But more importantly I would have missed out on a journey that has made me look more inwards than any I have been on before.

So on a day that it was going to rain truck- loads and winds were promising to sweep everything away, I decided I needed to go for the auditions. I weathered that storm to make it to TAPAC, which now after a season each of Mumbai Monologues and Charandas Chor has become second home in this foreign land. I landed at TAPAC, thankfully not very drenched to be greeted by some known faces, my first directors and gurus in theatre, Padma Akula and Ahi Karunaharan and a whole bunch of unknown people who had enthusiastically turned up to audition.

We were put through the paces at the workshop-like auditions which were meant not to test you but challenge you and help you find the actor within. I remember Ahi briefing us as the auditions for Mumbai Monologues were about to begin. He told us to be fearless at the auditions, be generous but one thing that has stuck with me since then, was the thing Ahi said, quoting Beckett, "Try. Try again",  he said. " Fail again. Fail better."

That day as I auditioned for Mumbai Monologues, I must have done cartwheels after a full decade, that too in a pair of dress pants and crisp freshly ironed shirt, I must have looked like a complete idiot, but I tried.

This time for Charandas Chor, I came prepared to lay everything out,  try hard and probably fail but I wanted to fail gloriously. We did a master and servant exercise in those auditions where we alternated playing master and servant. The master was meant to rule over the servant according to his/her whims and the servant was supposed to hate the master but obey every command  and try to please him/her. I was auditioning with Bhavna (our-to-be Rani-sahib) and Amit.

The turn came for Bhavna to be the master and Amit and me to be servants, during the on-the-spot improvisation, I fell on the ground and Bhavna then told Amit to pull me along and keep walking. I let out a yelp, a very visceral groan of pain, acting because Amit had pulled me by the arm that was apparently broken. I shouted, with the most pain I could manage to summon at that time. People laughed at it, but the pain for me was real, not physically but emotionally. I was channeling all the pain, all the hurt and frustration that I had shuttered away to maintain a brave face. I couldn't access that pain for a long, long time after that but I found it, just in time for the shows and could reach that raw pain once more. I hit those notes finally as my character Satturam while getting mercilessly beaten in the play by Charandas, just to steal a few coins off me. 

Images Courtesy - Prayas Theatre, Agaram Productions and Shovik Nandi Photography.