Actor brings out the Bollywood in Shakespeare

Chacko Vadaketh’s first major role onstage was playing Othello at Cambridge University during his student days. Since then, he has essayed many a Shakespearean role in his several decades as a performer, and like many, is an ardent admirer of the Bard’s words.

Little surprise, then, that when Chacko’s latest role in the production Shakespeare Goes Bollywood required some, let’s call it “Bollywoodising”, of Shakespeare’s lines, his initial reaction was mild horror.

“I was like, ‘What is he doing to Shakespeare?’ But the whole thing is a blend of Shakespearean stories into one big, epic saga. And I once I got into the story, I started having fun,” says Chacko, 52, who made a name for himself in the Malaysian theatre scene through his work with the now-defunct Instant Cafe Theatre and plays like Camelot and Romeo And Juliet, as well as various television and film roles; most recently, he narrated the Merdeka documentary Road To Nationhood.

Shakespeare Goes Bollywood, written by Fa Abdul and Matthew Koh (who also directs), brings together plot elements and characters from Romeo And Juliet, King Lear, The Merchant Of Venice, Hamlet, and various others, dressed up in typical larger-than-life Bollywood-style.

Presented by The Actors Studio Seni Teater Rakyat and produced by Big Nose Productions, the play is a tale of inter-religious romance in the days of the Indian Mughal empire, played out against popular Bollywood song-and-dance numbers.

image: http://www1.star2.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/str2_shgchacko_sharmilla_1.jpg

Mithran (left) and Sangheetaa are set to turn up the heat in Shakespeare Goes Bollywood.

The story revolves around the star-crossed love affair between goatherd Raghuman (Mithran Balakrishnan) and Jyothi (Sangheetaa Phary), the daughter of a moneylender. Thrown into the mix are a whole coterie of characters one might recognise, from the manipulative moneylender Kapulasundaraja (Narinder Kaur) and his two greedy daughters Gunguna (Abigail Sharmini Abisegam) and Rajee (Tilottama Pillai), to the revenge-motivated Billu (Suhunaraj Shanmugam).

Framing the play is Chacko’s character Chachaji, a wandering storyteller who narrates the play’s happenings to a 13-year-old girl he meets (played by Lavinya KC). Chachaji, however, is more than he initially seems.

“It’s actually a clever little premise that the writers have come up with. My character is a sort of pre-incarnation of William Shakespeare, and it’s through that device that we hear all these stories we recognise as being Shakespeare’s plays. And so it becomes the storyteller’s story too. As he’s narrating, it’s interesting how he’s talking about this epic tragedy on a Shakespearean scale, but it is also a personal story. And as an actor, I had to find that balance between all the melodrama and the story of a man,” he says.

And despite what purists might say, Chacko sees efforts like Shakespeare Goes Bollywood as yet another way to make the Bard’s works more accessible.

“Shakespeare found the essence of what made people tick, there’s a realness to his works that really allows people to make them their own. So they’re not meant to be locked up in an ivory tower.”

Read more at http://www.star2.com/culture/arts/2016/09/12/actor-brings-out-the-bollywood-in-shakespeare/#i2LXzTvb2I6xwZdH.99

With the cast and crew of Shakespeare Goes Bollywood being mostly made up of up-and-comers, Chacko was roped into the production by The Actors Studio Malaysia co-founders Datuk Faridah Merican and Joe Hasham. Having spent a lot of time working abroad in recent years, it was an opportunity for Chacko to connect with a new generation of theatre practitioners.

“It’s a very young company, with lots of young people; some with no previous stage experience. But the atmosphere is so vibrant and enthusiastic. Once I got them to stop calling me ‘Uncle’, it’s been great fun!”

More significantly, working with them gave him hope for Malaysia, at a time when he sees divisive sentiments gaining more ground.

“What struck me was that a production like this could only happen in Malaysia. Here we have a Chinese director who inherited his love for Bollywood movies from a grandfather who watched them on TV in the afternoons on RTM, and a Malay choreographer (Afham Zainal Abidin) who has come up with the most amazing choreography to Bollywood songs we all know and love. And we’re all working together to present an Indianised interpretation of Shakespeare! Something like this really gives me hope for Malaysia.”

Read more at http://www.star2.com/culture/arts/2016/09/12/actor-brings-out-the-bollywood-in-shakespeare/#i2LXzTvb2I6xwZdH.99