Chekhov's 'The Seagull' reinvented with Indian twist

Russian playwright Anton Chekhov's quintessential complexity of characters was given an Indian twist in a Hindi play titled 'Hansini' that was staged here last evening.

An adaptation of Chekhov's 'The Seagull' (1895), the play directed by Baharul Islam was performed as part of Bharat Rang Mahotsav, the annual theatre festival of National School of Drama (NSD) at Kamani Auditorium here.

With slight variations to the original story, Islam, a former NSD student, explores the Russian classic in an Indian setting, where a struggling theatre director Treplev is ridiculed by his mother, a veteran theatre artist, for experimenting with a new style in the performing art.
 

As the intense emotional friction between the mother-son duo plays out, the production in four acts takes the audience through a tangled web of relationships, with Treplev facing rejection not just from his mother but also from his actress and love interest Nina.

Other main characters of the play include famous writer Trigorin played by Islam, Nina played by Pallabi Phukan, school teacher Medvedenko played by Kunal Sarma, and Masha played by Barkha Bahar.

As the Russian playwright once said, "if there is a gun in the story, it has to be shot", the play appropriately ends with Treplev fulfilling the destiny of Chekhov's Gun by shooting himself, overwhelmed by emotions - from rage, jealousy and dejection to longing and failed love.

The production, Islam says, was his attempt to identify his responsibility as an artist.

He says he chose Chekhov's play as he saw his "own reflection from different angles" in the original work that dramatised romantic and artistic conflicts.

"Through this production, I am trying to check myself, tweak my sensibilities and identify my own sense of responsibility as an artist, as a director who has the opportunity of expressing his views to the world.

"To re-align my purpose and vision, and to keep my ego under check, 'The Seagull' was a perfect tool," he said.