When a mother is born

The play's cast includes Dilnaz Irani and Ankur Rathee, Joy Sengupta, Ashish Chawla, Anjula Bedi, Shilpa Mehta, Mia Melzer, Meher Acharia-Dar and Sheena Chohan

It was her search for good scripts that took Ila Arun to New York two years ago. And when the well-known folk singer and theatre personality came across Tammy Ryan's Baby's Blues, the script appealed to her for more than one reason. "The title itself caught my eye. Plus, she has written the story of a new mother, and the challenges she goes through while taking care of her baby with great sensitivity," explains Arun. It was also around the same time that her daughter Ishita had given birth to her second child, so it felt closer to home.

KK Raina

To flesh out the production and bring a male perspective, Arun tied up with her long-time collaborator, actor and director KK Raina. The American playwright and librettist's script will be staged for the first time in India under Arun and Raina's Surnai Theatre this Sunday.

Ila Arun

With no changes made to the script, the play is set in New York, and revolves around the seemingly perfect life of a woman, complete with a steady career, sensitive husband, and a baby on the way. But the arrival of the newborn sends her life on a downward spiral as she begins slipping into postpartum depression.

While there is greater awareness of the medical condition in the US, in India, it still remains a largely neglected issue; something that Arun found out more about in her conversation with psychiatrists during research for the play. "Though set in the US, it could be about a young couple living anywhere in the world today. Earlier, there were enough members in joint families to take care of the mother and the baby. Today, women are on their own. Not only does one need to find gentle ways of handling a newborn, but a new mother, too," she says.

She adds that while India has better maternity laws, what we also need is a provision for paternity leave; so that new fathers can be equally involved in the parenting process. "After all, when the mother is unhappy, it affects the child, father, family and society at large," Arun points out.

Postpartum depression as the play's theme came with concerns for commercial success. Stand-up comedy and musicals are the preferred modes of entertainment today, Arun says. "But Tammy's script is engaging. And at the end of the day, engaging the audience is what entertainment is about."

ON October 7, 5 pm and 7.30 pm
AT Experimental Theatre, NCPA, Nariman Point
CALL 22824567
Entry Rs 500 onwards

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