Imagination gone too far...
Lovneet Bhatt
Shahbaz Bajwa and his troop of actors of the Panjab University’s Indian Theatre Department presented the play The First Act: A Simulated Podcast, a unique dramatised experiment, at the Tagore theatre on Saturday. This simulated podcast was placed on the blurred stretch between truth and fiction, reality and illusion. The intention was clearly to be provocative and expose the audience to their lives in a postmodern world where nothing is ‘authentic’.
Drawing its essence from Baudrillard’s philosophical treatise titled Simulacra and Simulation, the play ended up being a muddled experience. Starting with simulated Batalvi talking about life as ‘slow suicide’, it moves onto a ‘real’ interaction on the nuances of a life of letters and art with renowned theatre artiste Neelam Mansingh Chowdhry. Absurd characters follow, commenting with their glitchy language on contemporary issues such as the water crisis in Punjab, and Punjabi musicians and their knack for rubbing shoulders and eventually getting into trouble with gangsters! All, of course, to no logical end.
Theatre of the absurd devices such as devaluation of language and irrelevance of plot were well employed. Here, the actors are theatrical objects as we are ideological puppets. Reality sweeps in again when a cock walks onto the stage with its refusal to be bothered by humans, it exhibits its plumage and is eventually carried away. Perhaps, it was a healthy reminder for us to take a walk in the woods — connect with nature you spiritualists; stay skeptical ye netizens!
On came a lady with a human dog, absurd enough. The dialogue that followed too was absurd. Absurd still was the fact that the podcaster had been a closeted dog all this time. Oh, a goat also tapped in, well at least it came some inches from the left wing before it decided, just like the cock, that clueless humans both on and off stage were not worth baaa’ahing at! But by then, the protracted repetition of aforesaid devices for over two hours had disengaged the audience. What could have one done? The ideological puppets were ‘trapped’ in this experience; are trapped in this mediated life.
