Her first exposure to theatre was watching Ram Leela in Delhi. “I was five years old,” says Arundhati Nag over lunch at Ranga Shankara. “Behind the government quarters, there was a ground where Ram Leela would be held. I remember watching the sardarji as Sita wearing a sari and singing with great gusto. I danced as a boy (I was not too happy about that) in a performance in our colony.”
Arundhati recalls moving to Mumbai in 1966. “I was 10 years old then and Marathi theatre happened. It was a ceremony. My father would have the tickets and every time Ma would be hyperventilating that he wouldn’t reach on time. I remember waiting for the batata vadas in the interval, discussing the play on the way back…”
At school Arundhati recalls being “lost” as she got a double promotion (her second) and she suddenly had to deal with HCF and other mathematical complexities. “Languages and colours were my forte.” Being from Delhi, her Hindi and English was better than her classmates and “I got picked to act in the annual play. So one year I played Desdemona in Othello and another year I was part of The Bishop’s Candlesticks. Theatre was creeping up on me.”
When Arundhati won a consolation prize from IPTA (Indian People's Theatre Association) at an inter-collegiate competition, she was inching closer to her destination.
“We used to hang out like youngsters do. Go to Bandstand, drink coke and listen to Pink Floyd. It was the time of flower power, torn canvas shoes and music. When a friend suggested we hang out at IPTA rehearsals, I did that. Shama Zaidi suddenly said, ‘You in the pigtails, would you like to act?’ I said okay and she cast me in Ek Chadder Maili Si. That was the defining moment.”
Arundhati was caught up in the “magic of meeting people who were steering the way in this sacred space. That did it. There was also the recognition and appreciation.”
Thanks to Arundhati’s felicity with languages, she became the toast of the theatre world. “I was doing upto 42 shows a month in Gujarati, Marathi, Hindi and English and earning good money. It was a great high, the credit for keeping me grounded goes to Ma.”
It was during this time that Arundhati met her future husband, Shankar Nag. “Shankar and the theatre world seemed more real to me than my college friends. Theatre doesn’t care who your parents are or where you come from, which is very different from the feudal world of film. When tragedy strikes, you grieve as a group but life goes on." When Shankar Nag passed away in a tragic accident, Arundhati was devasted. "I was immobilised, our friends would visit me and spend time with me. For them also it was catharsis and a therapy.”
The theatre community were a great help in realising Shankar Nag’s dream of an affordable space for theatre. “We didn’t have a puja for the inauguration of Ranga Shankara. We had five to six senior theatre practitioners perform for the opening. That was the puja, as theatre was god in Ranga Shankara. We had a 45-day festival of plays to mark the opening. Atul Kumar gave six months of his time to curate the opening. The place was abuzz with performances, theatre classes…”
The first play to be staged in Ranga Shankara was Rangayana’s Maya Sita Prasanga. “We started with the Mysore-based repertory as we are proud of their work.” Though now J.P. Nagar is a super busy place, when Ranga Shankara was started in 2004, it must have been quieter. “We were very sure that we wanted to have this space in south Bangalore as there is a passion for theatre here.”
Admitting to using a “soft filter” when deciding on the plays to be staged, Arundhati says, “if integrity is compromised, we do not give dates. Ranga Shankara is a serious space and when you charge money you better be serious!”
Arundhati has been successful in film as well, being part of the blockbuster Kannada film, Jogi and winning the National award for Supporting Actress for her role in Paa.
“I find film challenging, everything is magnified. Film is fragmented as opposed to theatre which is a continuous process. There are no second chances in theatre and the actor is king. On stage the magical moment of delivery is between actor and audience. The crafts are different.”
Arundhati will be performing Iranian writer Nassim Soleimanpour’s White Rabbit Red Rabbit as part of The Hindu Theatre Fest 2016 in Ranga Shankara on September 7. There are no rehearsals as the performer gets to see the script for the first time on stage. Ask her if she is nervous and Arundhati laughs saying, “It is a gamble, but then the audience is also gambling on us.”
For the future Arundhati says she would like to build a space “for rehearsals and conferences. There is the Ranga Shankara Company, and we are also going to the districts. Ranga Shankara should evolve into the petri-dish that understands the human predicament.”
The Hindu Theatre Fest 2016
The Title Sponsor of the event is YES BANK. The Associate Sponsor is Telangana Tourism. The Merchandise partner is Focus Art Gallery. The Mobility Partner is Ola. The Gift partner is Terra Earthfood and the Event manager is evam.
