Prasanna Ramaswamy may be soft spoken in the way many theatre practitioners are not, but so what? Words are not always the sole medium of conveying ideas. And Prasanna is well aware not only that theatrical expression goes way beyond the language of words, but also of the limitations of words, bound by contexts and conventional meanings. “Art is the only space to get liberated from the tyranny of meaning,” she says. As a documentary filmmaker, an observer of cultural traditions and a keen follower of literature, especially Tamil literature both contemporary and ancient, she brings her eclectic skills to her theatre productions. Movement, music, poetry and a variety of experiences blend in her productions with the active involvement of co-artists and actors. Currently working on “the changing landscapes, the displacement of people due to that and (the Tamil epic) ‘Manimekhalai’,” which is a “huge project” demanding funding and research, a production she hopes will take final form in about a year, Prasanna calls herself “mad” for continuing in theatre without funding support but puts it down to art being “so healing, energising and also seductive,” as well as the generosity and faith of the actors, dancers, musicians she has worked with. Excerpts from an interview with the director:
The SNA Award has recognised your work over several years. Looking back, how would you describe your own evolution as a theatre practitioner?
In every discipline the artist works on a core, from the beginning, something like a bindu and every created work is an expansion of that Bindu in Form; with time the tonality gets cleaner, the colour scale goes into more detail, fluidity gets developed, all of which is processed to move the discourse to greater nuances and more density. I can say that the same has happened to me, my work; to state it more clearly, I would say that the clutter, even at the idea level becomes lesser and lesser over the years and that helps to bring in more resonances and roundness to the text and performance. The angularity and one’s own anger and helplessness keep getting transformed into irony, more and more irony, to an almost humorous edge. An understanding of how to locate one’s own persona and punctuate that and emphasise it, is slowly becoming clear. Speaking specifics, I am more confident and relaxed with the movement phrases and experimenting more with the music as the years go by.
Often people in their youth are forthright in their opinions and as they grow older, become more malleable, accepting of conditions, less radical. Have you managed to avoid that sort of ‘softening’, remained as true to your convictions as when you started?
I started creating my individual works only in my 30s and till then it was like a kibbutz mentality of contributing to others’ works and considering it all ‘in theatre...for theatre’...it is a heady, somewhat innocent plunge...but those were also the most rewarding years which also brought unmitigated pleasure. Honestly speaking, this ‘being true to one’s convictions’ is not even something I consider an acquired quality or a conscious decision making. You are what or who you are, and you carry that on with your life in whatever you do, in your interactions, your personal space, the public sphere, everywhere in a certain way as yourself, your intrinsic character. And this character has its own aesthetics, its definite politics which takes its form in the manner in which you express your ideas, the clothes you wear, the people whom you seek, the way you observe and respond to life around you, in your interactions, even the way in which you read history, in short, which determines all your choices. And inevitably it becomes the basis, the character and centre of your created work. And it can only get stronger and more pronounced. Through life and work, I try to get the clarity and check what I think I know.
What moves you to select stylised media like poetry, dance, music — that convey messages subtly with multiple layers, rather than in a direct, narrative fashion — even as you deal with harsh themes such as violence perpetrated by community against community, the suffering of women, war, etc.?
The themes I have been working on, whether about war, annihilation, rebuilding life, territorial disputes, communalism, custodial rape, black marketing, these are basically human rights issues and unfortunately the prevalence and presence is across the globe and the recurrence is exasperating. The enormity of it is so astounding that inevitably the specific is always seen within the universal. When you work with such a canvas you arrange the discourse through a tapestry of sounds and movement, which can evoke what you intend and the spoken word connects the thread. Importantly, the aesthetics that I work on is the rasa and not catharsis; and the basic dictum there, is that you work on evocation. Narrowing it down further, I try and see if I can bring the quality of experiencing music to that of watching a play, like you listen to the raga Aahiri each time, irrespective of the song which is sung, it is the melody which has a great effect of evocation on you... I am more comfortable with the word ‘movement’ than ‘dance’ as the connotations are limiting. Even when I work with one hand gesture like Pataka which may be from the hasthabhinaya manual (with defined usages) throughout a play in different phrases, with different investments, I am looking at it as part of a movement and not so much dance; when I introduce the slapping of the thigh of Duryodana but combine it with the dwibangha position with a tandava dynamics to a character in a play about black marketeers or the charis and leaps to actors screaming “Jai Bajrangbali” as they unleash communal riots, or the playing and dancing of the parai drum and the evocation of Patayani dancing to symbolise Kotravai (Kali) as the embodiment of nature, these sequences have a greater efficacy to state the dreadful, yet in an unstated manner, which in my opinion has greater reach than something direct. I use film music very much in most of my productions and many elements of the popular culture as well. As I work with several narrations and the same actor many a time, playing different characters within the same play, which are actually archetypes and stereotypes, the movement and music effectively string them together and give a cohesive for me, and hopefully for those in the audience with a willingness to receive and partake in the experience.
You don’t so much take up a ‘production’ as a theme to be explored. For example, the recent “Valarkalai” had its seeds many years earlier. What is the process of bringing a theme to fruition?
I speak the same thing again and again; human rights issues, the appropriation of civil spaces, both physically and spiritually, destruction suffered by people and environment, both who are neither the connivers nor abetters of the crimes. If you cite the recent production, yes it has been spoken in different registers and in different arrangements through years. Once the emphasis was of complete shock and the exodus by the affected ones, and then it was about finding the meaning of life in exile, and now about the total annihilation and the apathy towards such brutality and the insane refusals to bring it to light or to rebuild a life but the continuous lashing of lies. Each time, according to the pitch, the mode of deliverance and the choice of texts and the singing, differs.
A production changes with every staging, affected both by the chemistry of the actors and the audience. Can you share some memorable responses to your plays?
As a live medium it happens always. The most recent one is what is fresh in memory. I was not very happy with the Delhi performance. It was raw, actors were speaking English for the first time and it was the premiere without us having a tech here, due to budget constraints. And a proscenium was a wrong choice I felt, even though the actors did their best. I felt it would have worked better in Meghdoot (theatre). In Chennai, we had a performance, rather a presentation, at a book shop, a small space where 7 actors and the singer, drummer, projectionist all had to jostle around, no costumes, no lights, and no levels even. Some 80 people managed to stand and sit and watched it one afternoon...electrifying would be the word. The actors were superb and the audience also gave so much, I felt. But the response of the audience is always very interesting. In 2002 after the show one woman came and told me “I was moved to tears...but I was also angry that you don’t make something that we can comprehend...” I asked her, “You said you were moved to tears and don’t you think that it is an understanding?” She didn’t agree though. Most of the time, even when they are not in agreement with all that we are saying, doing on stage, the audience have given us unquestionable attention. The criticism is not an issue at all but the attention is. I start my work from the point of denial of ‘understanding’ and ‘meaning’, as I feel Art is the only space to get liberated from the tyranny of meaning.
