Touch of whimsy

The Travelling Circus — Fairytale-like narrative, clowning and a lively mix of music meet in this play that tackles issues as grave as war and displacement

August 09, 2011 05:24 pm | Updated November 17, 2021 12:36 am IST - Chennai

The play "The Travelling Circus"

The play "The Travelling Circus"

The Travelling Circus

August 19

7.30 p.m., Sir Mutha Venkatasubba Rao Hall, Harrington Road, Chetpet

A boy who speaks only in numbers. Talking animals. Singing checkpoints. “The Travelling Circus” is a whimsical play, absurdist and physical, filled with fantasy and allegory.

But at its core, it tackles very real, political issues of suffering and displacement due to war.

Based on the short story “The Boy Who Spoke in Numbers” by Sri Lankan writer Mike Masilamani (MASii), the play speaks of the citizens of the ‘Small Village of Fat Hopes' who end up in a camp for ‘Ignored Defeated People' (IDPs) after civil war.

“The play is set in ‘The Island of Short Memories', where our point of view is reflected through the experiences of an innocent young boy who has lost everything,” says Tracy Holsinger, the director.

“He doesn't have any extreme prejudices either way, and is completely bewildered at what is going on around him. So he asks questions that we all ask: ‘Does war make an orphan of hope?' ‘Does anyone ever win a war?'”

This engaging, devised performance uses a fairytale-like narrative, physical theatre and clowning, and a lively mix of music — mash-ups and parodies of popular tunes from Les Miserables, Cabaret and Michael Jackson, among others — to make its audience think about these questions, without resorting to graphic displays of violence.

“I made a conscious decision not to depict extreme violence because it did not fit the tone of the story, or the impression we wanted to leave the audience with,” says Tracy. “But a constant awareness that this was all really happening spurred us on to find the gravitas with which to play out this fantasy, which is so symbolic of the sheer insanity our country has gone through.”

“The Travelling Circus” was the first original devised play performed by Mind Adventures, a Colombo-based experimental English theatre company, and premiered in Sri Lanka in 2009.

“The reactions to the first run of this show were extreme,” comments Tracy. “While one critic praised it as deeply humanist and the best piece of theatre in any language in a decade or more, another called it shameless, sententious frippery. I expected nothing less. With a topic such as this, there is no middle ground — it is such an emotional issue.”

***

REALITY THROUGH FANTASY

Director Tracy Holsinger says the greatest challenge of “The Travelling Circus” was to try and separate the emotions from the issue of war, and make the audience think about resolution.

How heavily does ‘The Travelling Circus' devised piece of theatre depend on the short story ‘The Boy Who Spoke in Numbers' by Mike Masilamani? And how much was improvised during rehearsals?

In terms of plot, we have not deviated from the story. I took a decision early on to use the format of a play-within-a-play. Inspired by stories of survivors taken from various published reports such as the Human Rights Watch Report of 2009, we created characters during rehearsals that would form the base of the play. It is through them that we hear accounts of real events, as they ‘break out of character' to argue with each other as to how the ‘play' should develop.

The set, the sound and the props have all developed through the devising process, where we experimented with various forms and worked only with found objects — whatever came to hand.

A lot has happened in the last two years, and we are taking this opportunity to update these references, while still using Mike's plot as the main framework of the play.

What were some of the challenges of tackling very real political issues — of war, violence and human displacement — through the prism of fantasy and fairytale?

The greatest challenge is to try and separate the emotions from the issue, and represent it in a manner that would ask the audience to think about resolution. The war is ‘over' but much still remains to be done in terms of reparations. There is so much racism, violence and loss to overcome. One thing we were quite certain about was that we didn't want to do anything too sentimental — it was too soon. Theatre thrives on metaphor, and this is precisely why the show became allegorical in essence. The biggest danger that presented itself was with regard to the acting. An actor cavorting about the stage in a lizard mask could lose sight of the main aim of the play and give in to the ridiculousness of his situation. Yet he is speaking of very real and tragic incidents. Also, there is a wistful irony in Mike's writing that needed to be reflected in tone of the playing. An insensitive portrayal would easily trivialise the subject matter.

Tell us a little about the decision to use music in such an unusual way in ‘The Travelling Circus' — playing with the lyrics, using mash-ups or remixes, and more.

For two specific reasons. The use of music to break up narrative flow is one of the standard devices of Brecht's Epic theatre, yet another reminder for the audience that they are watching a play. The whole structure of this play is closely moulded on his theory of Alienation that requires the audience to be objective and to think about the why and the how, rather than becoming emotionally involved with the characters.

The other reason is that music has always been used as a tool for social commentary and satire. The parodies and mash-ups are there to provide accessible global cultural references that the majority of the audience will be able to identify with. We used them to try and help us vocalise the feeling of helplessness that many of us felt at the chaos, the anxiety we were experiencing at that time. The platitudes in the lyrics were the only way to give voice to some things that are still too painful to articulate.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.