T he Forest , a children’s production, addresses two important issues: environmental degradation and the power of the imagination. The Forest was initially written as a novel by Puja Goyal 16 years ago. It was only recently that she turned it into a play. “The play starts when the world has almost come to an end as far as the environment is concerned and all the elements of imagination and fantasy that constitute a child’s world have also been lost. The children can see nothing but gadgets and technology,” says Puja, a writer based in Bangalore and Director of DreamScope Theatre.
In the play, a little girl wanders into a forest, where she comes across a tree, a leaf, a butterfly, a flower and a pixie. Both the girl and creatures are surprised to see each other as the girl has never seen such creatures and the creatures have long believed human beings are extinct. The girl gets to understand them and they her. The Forest is getting ready for the party that the Fairie Queen is hosting for them. They know that the Fairie Queen will be angry on seeing a human. Meanwhile, a wolf is lurking in the forest; he sees the girl and asks her to join him in destroying the earth. The girl is torn between her loyalty to her own species i.e. human beings and her new friends in the forest. Eventually, the fairies and foresters join forces to fight the wolf. “We’ve made the storyline simple to make it more appealing for children,” adds Puja.
The Forest is a visual splendour, with special attention paid to lights, costumes and stage production. “We’ve been working on this production for nine months. The play has some fight and dance routines, apart from light effects,” says Puja.
Tushar Patil, who marks his directorial debut with The Forest says: “The fight sequences are 10 to 15 minutes long. There are 12 touch combats that will happen for real, too.” For the dance sequences, Tushar has combined jazz, ballet and movements from Indian dances. “There is a flavour of many dance forms. I have worked with many choreographers. I trained with Shiamak Davar and in Classical dance too,” says Tushar. He adds that the play is a visual splendour as it revolves around the imagination.
The Forest , presented by DreamScope Theatre, will be staged today at 6 pm at Nayana Rangamandira, J.C Road. Tickets are priced at Rs. 300 and are available online at www.indianstage.in or can be booked by calling 9448055760. The actors also include DreamScope’s first scholar actors who have been training in the field of performing arts for the past one year and will be graduating today.
