At NCPA’s golden jubilee celebrations, Marathi actor Atul Pethe will bring to life Madhav Achwal’s Kimaya

Pethe will be performing at the NCPA Add Art festival in Mumbai on November 30. The festival that marks 50 years of the National Centre for the Performing Arts will also feature theatre, dance, Indian music, western classical music, jazz, stand-up acts, screenings, puppetry and workshops.

Pethe says, “Reading Kimaya is a great challenge, as it is a completely unusual text. It is all about architecture and sensibility. Architect Amol Chaphalkar from Solapur took the initiative in shaping this idea. We had several discussions and decided to give a visual dimension to reading by creating installations. We have done most shows in homes designed by noted architects such as Anupama Kundu, Shirish Beri, Habib Khan and Girish Doshi, and have tried to explore the space in these select homes. Hence, each show became magically new. It has been an unforgettable experience for me as an artiste,” says the actor who has closely worked with experimental theatre and devised a new form of theatre, ‘Ringan natya’, as a form of protest after Dr Narendra Dabholkar’s assassination in 2013.

Pethe has been regularly staging reading performances of masterpieces from Marathi literature since several years, including Kosala by Bhalchandra Nemade, Tarkachya Khuntivarun Nisatlele Rahasya by Jayant Pawar and Parwa Aamcha Popat Warla by Chandrashekhar Phansalkar.