Watch an improv performance drawn from stories by the audience at the venue
The team of Writers Sutta Maarne Gaye — (from left) Aditya Kashyap, Trisha Kanga, Nathan Almeida, Vera Raina, Karan Khurana, Tarang Hardikar and Tashi Vaid
What happens when you go to watch a play, but you don’t know the plot? The Spicy9s, a collective of six actors, writers, and comics will stage such a performance with their unique improvised play, Writers Sutta Maarne Gaye. The show demands to be experienced simply because there is no review that can give you spoilers; there are no critiques, interpretations, or exegeses. The writers have gone, as the title mentions, for a ‘sutta’ (slang for a cigarette break), and it is for the audience members to make up their own story or narrative of the play.
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The Mumbai-based collective will begin the show by listening to real life stories and anecdotes from three to four audience members who can volunteer to share them. They will then devise a play inspired by some of the themes. Aditya Kashyap, the brain behind the concept, who is also the producer and director of the show, studied improv in Singapore and has since performed in several countries for over 10 years. It was during a show in Singapore that he first stumbled upon this idea and having been a part of such projects, he believes that the experience will be refreshingly new to an audience that has watched plays with predefined plots, scripts, and characters. Kashyap shares how beautiful it can be to discover a vast sea of stories that emerge out of conversations with the audience, “People have spoken about sense of belonging, about home and adoption, about grief, death, and time. They have shared their coming out stories.” Since the narratives themselves are sensitive, the team borrows only the underlying themes, and not the personal stories that were shared.
Aditya Kashyap (right) Trisha Kanga
It is then interesting to think what rehearsals for these artists would look like. Trisha Kanga, the show’s co-producer, recalls, “During the initial months, we studied what makes a good story; we studied writing and techniques like save the cat and the three-act structure. We analysed movies, gave writing exercises to each other, so the rehearsals resembled a writer’s room. We practised dialogues and creating scenes until we were able to create one without having to discuss it.”
They also studied how to develop characters and learned that despite being a cast of six, the play doesn’t necessarily have only six characters. Kanga reveals how important it is for actors when they are required to play three distinct characters sometimes on stage, to ensure that the audience is not confused while identifying the character they are playing in that moment. “We are learning how to play the characters at their most individualistic and believable selves,” she signs off.
On: February 11 and 12; February 18 and 19; 8.30 pm
At: Veda Factory-ART STUDIO, Versova
Log on to: insider.in
Cost: Rs 300 onwards
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