Sundar Sarukkai’s Two Fathers is perhaps the only play that brings together the world’s greatest legends: Mahatma Gandhi and Albert Einstein. It is said that they were great admirers of each other, but didn’t ever meet during their lifetime. In Sarukkai’s play the duo’s life is explored through their relationships with their children. Einstein, who never acknowledged his daughter, Lieserl, and Gandhi, who had a troubled relationship with his son, Harilal Gandhi.
The play is being directed by Srinivas Bhashyam, who with Sheeba Shah started their theatre group Imaya in Goa. “This is our second play and is an original Indian play by Sarukkai, who is a respected scholar and a good friend of mine. This play is elegant, simple, and beautiful. We have first-time actors from Goa who perform in the play, and we have staged it half a dozen times. Now we are bringing it to Bengaluru,” says Srinivas.
Sarukkai, who is professor of Philosophy at the National Institute of Advanced Studies in Bengaluru, has written two critically-acclaimed plays, Hardy’s Apology and Not an Ordinary Man , which is on Einstein’s daughter. “I wrote Two Fathers because at the time I had also been thinking about Gandhi, as I had recently given some talks on him. So I decided to write the play to explore Gandhi’s and Einstein’s positions as fathers. They had their own ways of looking at their families, which was radically different. But I wanted to write a witty and reflective play on a parent-child relationship,” says Sarukkai.
Speaking about the kind of research he did, Sarukkai says: “I had read extensively on Einstein when I wrote Not an Ordinary Man . It is a challenge writing science plays because I don’t think they should be about popular science. I wanted to look at the characters without any judgement, and instead write about the events around their lives.”
Srinivas says that he was compelled to play Gandhi himself as he couldn’t find any actor suitable for the role. “Gandhi wasn’t extraordinary. He was beyond extraordinary. It would be difficult to believe such a man existed. I cannot help but be moved by what he achieved. He was willing to do anything in his pursuit of truth, and he listened only to his conscience.”
Two Fathers will be staged on June 30 and July 1 at Ranga Shankara. Tickets are available on bookmyshow.com and also at the venue.
