Relatively Speaking

Loneliness and its manifestations may be easy to feel but they are difficult to verbalise or explain.

Two Marathi plays Relatives and Gaadi will explore loneliness at the heart of modern living

Loneliness and its manifestations may be easy to feel but they are difficult to verbalise or explain. Writing a play that explores the breakdown of communication between relationships could get knotty but that’s what why some thinkers resort to writing . Twenty-year-old student and playwright Sagar Pandhare knew he had a tough task ahead when he decided to translate his observations into a 1 hour-15 minute play. One year of writing 15 well-considered drafts and two-and-a-half months of rehearsals later,the play Relatives will be up for showcasing at Sudarshan Rangmanch on Sunday,February 12. Gaadi,another play that reflects on loneliness,will be staged on the same day. Written by Pradeep Vaiddya,the drama delves into a rapidly deteriorating father-son relationship,and has been directed by Pandhare.

“Relatives is about what it means to be alone. In today’s age,none of us gets our own space,we can’t build a separate survival place for us at all,” says Pandhare of the story line. Relatives presents the emotional turmoil of a mother-daughter duo who are grappling with break-ups,professional ambitions and the divergent ideas of a ‘relationship’. The team went through a process of intense improvisation to get the feel of emptiness right. “We also put in a lot of ambient music to build the narrative – simple sounds like a phone ringing,the sound of a drill. Such disturbances are part of our lives,” says Pandhare.

Twenty-three-year-old Vikrant Thakar was struck by the complication in the script when he was approached to direct Relatives. “That was the first thing I noticed; how we have become so dependent on SMS communication that eye-to-eye talks are negligent,” he says.

On the other hand,Gaadi is a 45-minute dialogue,or the lack of it,between a father and his dejected son who has just lost his job. The son’s desperation inspires suicidal thoughts in him,but his unlettered father can’t reach out to him and talk. Everything unfolds through the course of a night at a village railway station. “The fundamental point here is of aimlessness,” says Pandhare,the director of Gaadi. “Here too there is loneliness and it erupts in the form of suicidal tendencies.”

(Both the plays have been produced by Shabdamegh and will be showcased 7 pm onwards on Feb 12)

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