“Look at these people, these idiots. Hmph. Bloody Indians…” bellowed the mighty British sepoy, with a newspaper sash and a hat made out of the same, as they romped around with a nasty expression, pushing India and Indians to dust. A three-month old female foetus asks us if we want to know who she is. The dingy room at the Tarnaka Welfare Association brightened up to a variety of performances put up by the first batch of Evam's ‘First Rush', a theatre workshop in the city.
The 16 people from the city registered for the workshop got more than what regular theatre workshops offer. Apart from acting, under the leadership of an external director, they also got to design costumes, sets, stage settings, properties and even market the show and take charge of selling tickets.
‘First Rush' is Evam's effort to democratise theatre. TMK or Kartik of Evam says that ‘First Rush' is for people who want to do theatre, but they don't know how to do it. “First Rush is to create a movement of theatre and popularise it among people. The goal is to give everyone a chance to get on stage and experience the magic of a live performance.”
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The 45-day workshop is rather exhaustive. Sushmita Bhandari who participated in the workshop says that it was well structured and designed to suit an amateur theatre enthusiast with elements of voice projection, body language, dialogue, creativity, story-telling thrown in.
The participants will rehearse for 45 days and put up a production of their own in December. The play will be directed by Stu from England and Azadeh Mirzaei, an Iranian theatre graduate from Osmania University. Azadeh has earlier directed Woody Allen's God , in Hyderabad.