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Aamir Raza?s back on stage, live in 1947!
His latest opus, 1947 Live sweeps through the freedom struggle of India.
The badshah of big theatrical productions is back. Aamir Raza and Virat Husain’s latest opus, 1947 Live sweeps through the freedom movement. It includes such livewire moments as Ram Prasad Bismil and Chandrashekhar Azad blowing up the train to Kakori, Bhagat Singh and Raj Guru shooting Saunders in Lahore and Gandhi’s march to the sea to make salt.
It’s not exactly a small scale production. Husain reckons it cost some Rs two crore. But then putting up gargantuan productions is old hat to Husain. Both his last productions, The Legend of Ram and Kargil were noticed for their lavish sets, costumes and stage gimmickry. While Legend cost Rs 1.5 crore, Kargil was mounted at a cost of Rs one crore.
“Nobody has come out with a production that is this big,” says Husain without a trace of modesty. “I keep competing with myself and I feel the audience too expects something extravagant,” says he. Funding usually comes from corporate sponsors and for 1947, Husain has a line-up that includes ITC-Welcomgroup, Apollo Tyres and Unitech.
Husain has been actively involved with theatre for the past three decades. He believes that extravagant, over-the-top plays are a way of giving meaning to contemporary theatre. “Competing with cinema and television isn’t easy. It takes a lot to bring people to the theatre. Unless you offer something really big, you’re not going to be able to hold the attention of your audience.”
Husain says that though India has a rich tradition of nautanki and dance theatre, contemporary theatre has been popular only for the last two decades. “Otherwise the theatre that we have is basically borrowed from Shakespeare or Bernard Shaw. They were translated, scripted and then shown,” he says.
1947 Live is a two-hour play. It is timed to coincide with 75 years of the Dandi march and 100 years of the Swadeshi movement. The second half of the play revolves around Nehru, Jinnah, Gandhi and Mountbatten. Husain has flown in two actors, Martin Bishop and Martin Auckland from London to play Lord Mountbatten and Lord Irwin respectively. The play has an all male cast.
