Brain drain

“Lots of scenes have changed though the structure remains the same,” says Kumar. The most prominent change in this devised play has happened in the form of two new actors—Konkona Sen Sharma and Munish Bharadwaj. The Company Theatre regulars Rajat Kapoor,Sheeba Chadha,Vinay Pathak and Ranvir Shorey complete the cast. “New actors have brought in new energy to the play,” says Chadha. However,when the revived play will be staged for the first time in Mumbai on August 15 and 16 at NCPA,Sen Sharma will be missing and will be replaced by Sipra Singh.

Shorey essays the central character of Jimmie G,who has lost the ability to form new memories due to Korsakoff’s syndrome. He can remember nothing of his life since his demobilisation at the end of WWII,including events that happened only a few minutes ago. His girlfriend Sen Sharma plays doctor while the rest of the cast help him reconstruct his memory. “Playing Jimmie G was my first professional theatre appearance,” says Shorey who is reprising the role. He finds this role tougher than his more popular clown character in C for Clown.

“Who you are is so dependant on what you remember,” says Kapoor as he talks about how the book has touched him. Though the play is based on his story,Kumar feels that elements from the other 23 other essays of the books have pervaded into the play.

With this production,which comes after Hair and Hamlet-The Clown Prince,the Company Theatre’s inclination toward devised plays becomes even more pronounced. “We don’t want to work with scripts which are alien to us. We want to continue with this journey till we get bored,” says Kumar. Actor-director Kapoor shares his views. “We don’t want to do plays which are written by someone in another time.” Regarding Hair and Hamlet,he says that the fairytale of Rapunzel and Shakespeare’s play respectively served as starting points for them. “Hamlet is a completely different play of clowns trying to stage the original play,” says Kapoor,who is acting on stage after a long gap and enjoying the high it gives.

For the play that boasts of a star-studded cast,Kumar had blocked their dates nearly six months ago. Before the play premiered at Rangashankara,Bengaluru,they had a three-day residency programme,followed by rehearsals. “These sessions were dotted with debates and discussions. All team members contributed in improvising the play,” says Chadha,who loves doing devised plays as much as scripted ones.