KILLING TIME
&
THE ATTEMPTED ASSASSINATION OF FAMOUS WRITER
The Hindu Metroplus Theatre Festival
7. 00 PM, TUESDAY 7 AUGUST 2007
The first play on the attempt to assassinate a famous writer by two naive villagers was a poignant and telling statement on the lure of lucre. It is many things in many layers. These two bumpkins are no different, at one level, from those who make up the agrarian exodus to cities for a better living. At another level, the play is a study of a contaminated human mind that is very Faustian in the hands of the lady who is their Mephisto luring them to sell their soul, to a cause they don’t even comprehend or believe in But in the end it is a very BoBo-Gogo Becketian predicament, having waited for their own Godot, as the realise the futility of it all. This idea was beautiful. Mr Murari had chosen his concept well. But the number of platitudes and clichéd expressions that crept in when the playwright starts getting into psychological and philosophical territory detracted from the theatrical illusion we were getting mesmerised into. The moments of theorising were agonising to say the least. But knowing it is a first performance script and not yet published, there still is time to rework it into a fine piece of theatre.
The second play was nothing to write home about in terms of scripting. But the narrative flow was neater and the dialogues very Fugardian. It reminded me of the two convicts in “The Island” by Athol Fugard. Except these are an old assassin and a young and proud killer. Ishwar was simply fantastic, to put it mildly. ‘The Killing Time” was and will remain an example of what the power of theatre is! If you put two right actors who have a good chemistry and pit their pride and acting talents against each other, you have a coup. It is to the credit of director Deesh Mariwala that this play worked from page to stage. His minimalist style of theatre making complemented an evening that would have been spoilt with sets and sound for distraction. As for the script, though it was taut in its narrative structure and inventive in its cyclical style, I must say I left the hall wondering whether it was the acting or the playwright that won the day. Whatever the truth, Chennai Theatre was the winner and richer for the experience.
Krishna Kumar