Hyderabad-based theatre personality Preksha Trivedi was pleasantly surprised when actors Anurag Wate, Srikanth and M Sarvesh approached her with Art, a Hindi production adapted from Yasmina Reza’s French play with the same name.
Having read all the works of the French playwright, Preksha, who is producing the play, found it an ideal way to start the New Year. The story of Art — with three friends as protagonists, to be staged on January 8, depicts a slice of life. A friend buys a painting with white lines on it and tries to justify the purchase although the other two friends find it outrageous. Amid arguments and disagreements, the trio realise at the end that it is their friendship that matters above everything else. Preksha says the light-hearted play is a feel-good one.
Preksha Trivedi
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It is also a shift for Preksha who has mostly produced psycho thrillers, including the recent English play The Pillowman. “The content was getting only darker and I remember my father asking me if I was going through something. Maybe I was just being too fixated on certain types of stories. Fortunately, I came across this play that didn’t follow that pattern.”
Actors during rehearsals
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The actors, who are also friends in real life, devised the play on their own. They had staged the same play in English in Lamakaan in 2015. The artistes had gone off from theatre owing to reasons of their own and now they have come back as a group to re-devise it. The script has been tweaked a bit to make it contemporary. “We have added new references to discuss different aspects such as a new-age wedding, problems with relationships, the COVID-19 and a reference to the Hyderabad theatre scene.”
The audience might not laugh out loud while watching the play but will smile throughout, assures Preksha. “There are no messages in it, only a warm and light-hearted feeling; The characters feel like us.”
Yasmina Reza’s Art in Hindi to be staged on January 8 at 5 pm and 8pm; ₹200; bookmyshow.com
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