Parrots Lies

PARROTS' LIES
by
Andreas Marber

Venue: Top Storey, Alliance Francaise, Chennai
Dates & Time: 19 May (7.15 pm), 20 & 21 May (3.15 and 7.15 pm)

Donor Passes: Rs. 100/-

soon to be available at Landmark (Nungambakkam), Words & Worth (Bessie) & Alliance Francaise - Reception

Or leave message here or call at 98840 29865 for advance/bulk booking.

Performance has objectionable contents. We rate is PG/16. So don't say we didn't warn you.

In the cast:

Krishna / Varun - The Actor
Mathivanan R - The Author
Gaayathry S - The Director
Vivek Sivaraman - Lighting Engineer
Karan Ram - Stage Manager
Krishna Kumar. S - Sound Engineer

Stage Design & Artistic Direction - Krishna Kumar. S

Synopsis:

An author has written a play for an actor. The name of the play: A Piece of Shit. The title role: A Piece of Shit, The actor seizes his chance: A Piece of Shit in a piece called A Piece of Shit; that is like Hamlet in Hamlet. Parrots’ Lies is a humorous expose of employees in the creative industry, constantly with knives on the backs of others, in a desperate attempt to regain their lost reputations.

Parrots’ Lies is a wild and disgusting game of power, a horribly realistic representation of actions and gestures - acts of oppression and gestures of subjugation and genuflections.

About the Author:

Andreas Marber, born in 1961, is one of contemporary Germany’s respected and popular playwrights and was the dramaturge at the Nationalhaus (National Theatre) Hamburg. Parrots’ Lies, incidentally, had its Hamburg premiere in January 2001. Parrots' Lies had its Asian premiere in March 2001 at Chennai, produced by Masquerade. This is a production we first gave the Asian premiere of in March 2001, with Yog Japee, Lekha Washington & Pushkar P in the cast.

Read the media write-up about that production here.

And Read the post-performance review here.

Brought to you in association with our community partners:
Adyar Times/Mylapore Times, Cedars - Flavours of Mediterranean, Prithvi Sound Lease & Stagefright Productions.

With Support from Max Mueller Bhavan, Chennai

MSND - Tim Supple

Title: A mid summer nights dream
Direction: Tim Supple
Mathivanan Rajendran- engrossed audience member
Venue: Bucks Auditorium

Over the past year following Gareth Armstrong s workshop and Masquerades MSND I have been able to understand, appreciate and enjoy Shakespeare. During our workshop on the tempest 'our mantra' was "Shakespeare was an actor too" which largely goes to say that every scene and line written by him was written from a performers perspective (which would also explain his terrible sense of geography!!) . However there seems to be several interpretations to the text and characters of his plays. It gives the director just enough freedom to visually express the story in his style without actually disturbing the plot.

Tim Supple s MSND was an absolute visual treat. There was very little emphasis on the iambic or the text which gave a different perspective to the entire play. I thought the choice of Languages for the characters was brilliant. Tamil suited Egeus' outcry,Hindi was apt for the bungling bully bottom and the naivish Puck, English for all the women was interesting and effective. Considering the volume of lines i was nt sure initially if a Malayalam speaking Oberon/Theseus would work but the rhythm of the language lent lot of colour to the king of shadows and also gave the lines a more poetic feel.

Another the thing which i found really interesting was the characterization. Helena was fiery and commanding unlike the self-pitying weak character usually chosen. An unconventional looking Puck, Also the hidden relationship between Puck and Oberon was chosen to be left unexplored. The purple dye was shown not as a drug that induces love but one that arouses carnal lust (which i think was the original idea) and this was effectively communicated.

Enjoyed the sequences with the mortals and all the musical frills. In particular I really liked the way the fairies entered tearing through the paper, The "roundel and a fairy song" before titania sleeps. Personal favs Egeus,Bottom,Fairy.I enjoyed Palani s potrayal of Duchasana at the other festival ( directed by Bala) and this was no different.

I guess one can t say "take away the music, take away the frills and what do you have left..." since everything was an integral part of the production.I ve seen 4 versions of MSND and each one of them have lent a unique perspective into the script. It was a new experience for me and thoroughly enjoyed it and i look forward to more experiences on both sides of the fourth wall........

"A Midsummer Nights Dream"

"....either to die the death or abjure the society of men...."


"A Midsummer Nights Dream" by William Shakespeare
Directed by KK
Produced by Masquerade
Mathivanan Rajendran - Oberon/Theseus
Allianz Francais - September 23-26 2005

I remember working on the sets of Mouk when KK (Of whom i must admit i was quite terrified of) said he wanted to have a word with me, well the last time anyone said that i was suspended indefinately from college!! I was thrilled and relieved when he said he wanted me to come for the MSN workshop. I don t read (rather i think i can't ...) so i had to ask Gitanjali to narrate the entire sequence of events in the play during one of our backstage bonding sessions @ mouk.


" ....fair vestal throned by the west..."


I remember belabouring over the pentameter and crossin my fingers hopin i won t have to play Oberon!! Of course Murphy decided to continue his little game with me and had me playin Oberon and Theseus as well (i must admit i am eternally grateful for the same!!). It was a huge break for the entire LS bunch and I felt like I was growing with the whole lot of em...Monty Porko,Karan,Varma,Gits....

Shankar and Yousuf Da the senior members of the cast were extremely helpful as were the younger members ...shyam aditi etc. A parallel can be made between our production and the "play within the play" itself, Here we were inexperienced enthusiastic (i dare not say actors!!) performers working towards the directors vision.Of course stumbling blocks were aplenty but i d like to believe everything turned out well.

The brilliant compostions ... the romance that transpired backstage....peering through the wings to make a head count (and hell 8 full shows!!) Meeting my 85 year old grandmother after the show.....The bouquets and the occassional brickbats....the moment that KK went on his knees after the show and humbled everyone of us... There was something magical about the show,dangerous times when you start to care less about the audience and even less about what they think.....

Top 7 s of the production - (besides having my noisy friends watch me!!)
- Varshithas chocolate cake
- Ahem!!
- Getting make up on (i must confess i really enjoyed it!!)
- Bumming Fags off Varma
- Bumbling Narasiman
- Kicking puck all over the floor and having the audience diss me
- Trippin with the fairies on the lights and Trips kickin Lysander,Helena & Demetrius

Top Iambics...
- Ill met by moonlight.....(had to be!!)
- Fare thee well nymph
- Thou art my love thou art i think
- Please die!
- Oh wall, sweet and lovely wall
- Transperent Helena...!!!

3 lessons:
1) The Creative inputs and intellegence behind playing a character are time consuming and a lot more difficult than it may seem
2) The human perspective of performers (will elucidate later)
3) Karan will hit on anything from 6-60!!( kiddin dear bully bottom!!)

Thank you KK for all the grooming and the opportunity itself.A tad late but what the hell....