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V Gangadhar

The Entertainer

Appearing in a play can be quite an experience. I should know because I have done it many times in the past. I acted in my first play when I was in standard IV in a village school in Tirunelveli district. It was a mythological-cum-musical, with the actors singing the dialogues.

I played the role of Sri Rama, who was confronted by an angry Parusurama immediately after he had broken the divine bow, an act which made him eligible to marry Sita. However, Parusurama suddenly appeared on the scene, scoffed at Rama's achievement and challenged him to break the bow he was carrying. Rama did this without any fuss and Parusurama left the scene after apologising to the Lord.

The play lasted about 20 minutes. The actors strutted on a makeshift stage carrying toy bows. I had no make-up on but wore a colourful, silk dhoti. A quiverful of arrows was stuck on my back. The show went off quite well, but then students of a primary school were yet to develop critical faculties! My elder sister tells me even now about how I kept bothering them all the time by repeating the dialogues again and again.

The second time I appeared on the stage was when I was in standard VIII and studying in a convent school in Tambaram, a suburb of Madras. Three of us boys in a class of 48 girls were chosen to play the roles of greedy brahmins punished by the legendary vidushak, Tenali Raman.

We wore the traditional dhoti, were provided with makeshift tufts of hair and had holy ash smeared all over our bodies. I was a bit embarrassed when I noted many of the girls giggling at our bare torsos. But the role had one redeeming feature. The plot involved Tenali Raman inviting us for a feast. We sat down on the stage and helped ourselves to delicacies spread on huge banana leaves, but on suffered the indignity later on of being branded with hot irons by the vidushak and ran around the stage holding on to our dhotis and crying out 'ayyo, ayyo.'

Mind you, I was not a flop actor but the opportunities were few. The next chance to display my talent arrived when I was a young man-about-town in Ahmedabad. The local South Indian Association decided to stage a Tamil play and chose a romantic comedy where the hero was a painter.

The association was dominated by a dynamic, versatile and good-looking housewife who thought nothing of performing varakshmi puja in a traditional nine-yard saree in the morning and doing the cha-cha-cha at the local gymkhana club in the evening. She was a family friend of ours (I was living with my sister and brother-in-law). Naturally, she had to play the heroine in the play.

I was not an active member of the SIA, but was summoned to the office one evening. The secretary informed me that I had been chosen to play the hero's role in the play which was originally assigned to someone else. But the 'heroine' disapproved of the choice of hero. According to her he was 'too short and dark', demanded that he be changed forthwith and recommended me.

The managing committee caved in and, in short, I was in.

I played the role of a painter. Since painting was low on my list of priorities, I did not even know how to hold a brush. These deficiencies were quickly rectified, but I found the romantic scenes quite embarrassing. I did not mind holding hands with the heroine and looking deep into her eyes. The problem lay in the awkward Tamil dialogues. "Darling, you are my life, my soul, I live for you. I love you more than life itself..."

It sounds so natural in English. But the same, translated into Tamil, was long winding and sounded unnatural. I had to sweat it out but, finally, the play was quite a success.

Over the years, I read any number of plays and their critical reviews. As a lecturer of English literature, I also enjoyed teaching them. The Restoration Comedies were an unalloyed delight, so were Moliere, Ibsen, Synge and Tennessee Williams.

The English major students in the college where I taught were keen to stage a play for the annual cultural festival. As the youngest lecturer in the department, I was asked to help them out by directing the play. We chose a Moliere farce which featured a cuckolding husband often thrashed by his aggressive wife.

Casting was a problem. The girl students were a smart lot and the female roles were filled easily. The search for the hero was quite frustrating since all the boys were dull and unable to speak English. One day, some of the girls suggested, "Sir, why don't you play the hero? You are the best choice."

After much persuasion, I had to agree though it meant romping on the stage with my students. Many of my senior colleagues did not like this one bit and hinted that such 'familiarity' did not keep up with the dignity of the teaching profession. By this time, I was too far gone into the project and could not withdraw.

The play turned out to be the hit of the evening. Since my character was a fat, obscene-looking fellow, I had to tie a couple of cushions on my body and run around on the stage while my wife and my mistress, in turn, chased me and beat me up. The audience simply lapped it up. We received a standing ovation. My principal and the venerable head of the English department (who had taught me at the post-graduate level) congratulated me warmly. My day was made.

That was my last appearance on the stage. It was good to 'retire' at the peak of one's career. But my wife's career may be just beginning and her going on stage only confirms my resolve never to return to the stage. One 'star' in the family is enough.

Illustration: Dominic Xavier