Delhi is set to experience a cultural treat as Department of Art, Culture, and Languages, Government of Delhi along with Sindhi Academy is up with the four-day Sindhi Drama Festival 2014.
In a bid to provide new direction to Sindhi Theatre, Vichhoo, a major production of The Impostures of Scapin by French playwright Moliere and Muhinji Zaat, a Sindhi translation of Jat Hi Puchho Sadhu Ki will be featured at the festival.
Vichhoo is directed by the actor-director-critic Manohar Khushalani. The play in Sindhi, is translated by Mohini Hingorani, from Moliere's Les Fourberies de Scapin (The Impostures of Scapin), enacted for the first time in 1671.
The story of Vichhoo revolves around two young men, Kanu and Mohan who take the advantage of their fathers' absence and fall in love with unlikely and penniless beauties. Kanu has secretly married Khimya and Mohan has secretly fallen in love with Mira and both need money to help solve their dilemmas. But their fathers, Motumal and Hardasmal, return from a trip with their own marriage plans for their respective sons.
Vadhu, after hearing many pleas for help, comes to the rescue of the young romantics. The final scene of the first act is a vaudeville/music hall version of Molière's famous scene in which Vadhumal spins a yarn of kidnapping, foreigners and ransom. No one knows who Khimya and Mira really are.
There is a final chase and dance among all the participants, which, inevitably, becomes the raucous, delightful curtain call.
The other play Muhinji Zaat which is to be staged, is a comedy which specialises in churning out educated illiterates. The play is a Sindhi translation of famous Marathi playwright Vijay Tendulkars’s famous comedy Pahije Jatiche from Vasant Deo’s Hindi translation Jat Hi Puchho Sadhu Ki by Asha Bhatia. It is perhaps the first Sindhi performance of Vijay Tendulkar in Delhi directed by Prakash Bhatia. The play is an attempt to bring before the audience a different kind of comedy which is seldom tried in Delhi’s Sindhi theatre circle.
When: 17-20 April
Where: Sri Ram Center for Art and Culture
Timing: 6:30 PM onwards