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Journalism of Courage
The festive season brings with it a re-birth of dance, drama and song. This year, thanks to effort of the India Habitat Centre, Delhites have had the opportunity to see some really wonderful theatre from Mumbai. Stunning8217; and awesome8217; are the two words that keep coming to my mind as I try to describe Going Solo, a theatrical troika packed into an evening. The scripts were skillfully adapted and one saw some brilliant performances, especially by Kittu Gidwani, Sheraz Patel and Anahita Oberoi.
A few days back, TAG staged Anyone For Breakfast as part of its silver-jubilee activities. Although the set design by Barry John rated among the finest I had seen, it seemed wasted on the Derek Benfield comedy, which failed to tickle. Reminiscent of the senseless television sex comedies of the 8217;70s and directed by Prabha Tonk, the play was a disappointment.
With so much happening in the city these days, one has to be really selective about the way one spends one8217;s precious evenings. This week, Chandralekha is dancing with her troupe, which is one evening I won8217;t miss for anything. Not only does the gleaming, shocking-white cascading hair that frames her face give the artiste a compelling persona, it has also become her signature and USP. Now in her 70s, but still always impeccably dressed in exquisite sarees, the dancer continues to look enchanting.
Acknowledged as the pioneer of dance choreography in the country, it was Chandralekha who steered the Indian dance sensibility into a different realm. One that is non-narrative and non-decorative. Her aesthetics is not about being pretty, or about being an adornment, but that of line and form. Of purity, vitality, energy and the power of the body. Chandralekha has demystified traditional dance, and freed it from gods and goddesses. So, even though her dance works are modern, they remain very Indian.
Chandralekha attributes the internalisation of ritualistic beauty to her mother, who was extremely religious, and the irreverence towards religion to her father. Another major influence in her life was the actor and poet Harindranath Chattopadhyay, who also happened to be Sarojni Naidu8217;s brother. Chadralekha talks with complete candour about this great love affair. Her eyes glitter as she recites the poetry and recalls the man she shared a live-in relationship with. It was he who introduced her to the various dance forms and gurus. Chandralekha settled for the renowned Bharatanatyam teacher, Ellappa Pillai, and took to dance as an all-engaging activity.
In her latest choreographic composition, Raga: In Search of Femininity, Chandralekha once again tries to liberate the audiences from what she calls 8220;the puritanical horrors of the body.8221; This is the work Chandralekha is presenting at the prestigious Wave Festival at the Brooklyn Academy of Music later this year. At an earlier performance at the same venue, Chandralekha was the first Indian to have thrown a purple tantrum. She demanded top rates and the same treatment as that reserved for the famed German dancer Pina Bausch.
Chandralekha got away with it and the stage was turned over to her for rehearsals a month earlier, and not three days, as earlier suggested by the Academy. Chandralekha8217;s dance and aesthetics are informed by values and beliefs acquired at the painful expense of a life lived entirely on one8217;s own terms. Breaking traditions and denouncing revered institutions like family, marriage and motherhood could not have been easy at a time when not many women dared, or were allowed, to chart out their own lives. That is why Chandralekha the woman fascinates me as much, if not more, than Chandralekha the dancer.
