A restored Portuguese villa in Goa was the venue for an exciting site-specific theatre performance over the last few days. A short ride from Panjim city, Sadhana Dell’Arte is one of the ongoing Serendipity Arts Festival’s many locations of interest. The space’s vintage interiors played host to Sonnets c 2018 , a re-imagining of Shakespeare’s Sonnets by the Delhi-based Guild of the Goat. The closing act of the festival’s ‘Theatre at Home’ sideline, it catapults 17th-century quatrains of love and longing into a contemporary setting.
However, there remains a timeless feel to the proceedings, and the backdrop still bears traces of old-world dereliction, despite the incriminating (and almost anachronistic) millennial-era mobile phones brandished by characters as they waltz in and out of rooms.
Audiences, of not more than 20 at a time, follow suit, armed with the rules of engagement spelled out in advance by Anirudh Nair, the evening’s impresario, and director of an intrepid ensemble that comprises of Dhwani Vij, Manishikha Baul, Amba-Suhasini K Jhala, Mohit Mukherjee and Tejus Menon.
The troupe arrived at an empty house, and populated it with the trappings and personal histories of a lived-in household, almost entirely from scratch.
Vignetted narratives
As the evening unfolds, ushers guide spectators through the venue’s many rooms, prompting them to piece together a narrative of smudged hues and blurred lines, each vignette offering a clue to a grander design. Sartorial props signifying the piece’s shape-shifting protagonists — the poet, the muse, the lover — provide powerful subtext to individual scenes, that play out the sonnets in both literal and figurative ways. As expected, the bard’s iambic pentameter flows in full measure, its sheer poetry in evidence when voiced by the likes of Jhala, whose pitch-perfect classical timbre is one of the evening’s many strengths. Of course, Nair’s reputation as a homegrown Shakespeare-meister precedes him. Some of the verses are translated into Hindustani by Tanzil Rahman, but here, the delivery by the actors is unfortunately stilted. An impressive musical palette by Sahil Vasudeva, streams across the space, but appears to be used merely as punctuation.
The performed interludes present a strange dichotomy. The more archetypal moments that we recognise from art and literature — the familiar foibles of star-crossed men and women — seem a little pat almost to the point of superficiality. A flirty encounter in an attic bedroom is played out without reinvention; declarations of love frequently bubble to the surface like clichés; and even when Nair leads the sonnets to darker territory, it isn’t particularly chilling.
Yet, there are moments that are raw, and pregnant with the messiness of human lives. For instance, in the dim confines of a bathroom, a wordless Vij effects a deeply affecting set-piece that speaks of abuse and danger, and perhaps being caged in by desire and jealousy. ‘Sonnet LXI’, almost ominously, pipes in from outside as she waits uncertainly for succour or clarity. This is a young actor with a great ferocity of spirit.
Similarly, another completely non-verbal sequence featuring Jhala and Vij, as possibly competing lovers of the same person, who are also irrevocably drawn to each other, is hilariously piquant but also touching. The actors’ eyes speak volumes at times. Although we would like to tarry awhile, the ushers urge us on to yet another piece of the puzzle. A running time of just around an hour, feels too little to savour moments offered up merely as titbits rather than proper mouthfuls.
Queer strategies
Ultimately, the sonnets themselves do not cross over entirely. Yes, many of the sequences may have strongly marinaded in their essences, but the exchanges lack the conversational flair or intent of conviction that might have restored the text sufficiently to popular imagination. Artifice, deliberate or otherwise, weighs down the scenes. Characters are put through the wringer, but we catch them only in the dishevelled aftermath of an unknown turmoil.
Sonnets c 2018 is also a piece that is unsure of how to utilise the material’s inherent homo-eroticism. It professes neutrality towards gender, and allows its actors to create interweaving connections that bely conditioned expectations. Yet, a sprinkling of same-sex encounters seemed aimed at a strategic rather than organic queerness in an enterprise scrubbed clean of any real edginess. The play is certainly exquisitely mounted, not lacking in talent or technique or finesse of presentation. The venue is particularly appropriate, but it does leave one with the feeling of a squandered opportunity, but not for want of trying.
