JOIN USIt is a dimly lit room emblazoned with colourful pictures of bees and plants sans the perfunctory decor of a classroom.
Hunched over their elbows or with their legs stretched out, children sit beside their mentors looking intently on screen as their photography facilitator Pratyoosh Kshyap takes their first photography lesson.
Unlike regular classes, this one’s chirpy and exuberant and these eight-14-year-old children are curious, inquisitive and expressive to say the least!
And why wouldn’t it be, it’s time for summer workshops, and children seem to be having a ball in Yellowcat Theater’s ‘Making it’ sessions at Bumblebees School. In the midst of all this fun, they are preparing for a theatrical performance at Instituto Cervantes on June 14.
As they hop downstairs for their dramatics class, another facilitator Mohit Mukherjee explains, “In the first week, they learnt the basics of playwriting.
So, all of them have a good idea about what goes into writing a play. Flicking through pictures, asking them questions and talking about the photo stories in their first lesson, Pratyoosh engaged them creatively in their first photography lesson today.”
Seeing the palpable excitement in the room, it’s evident that the children are absorbing all this knowledge with a good dose of fun.
Before they set out for a round of acting, their mentors get them in the groove by playing a game. All warmed up, they huddle together for a round of discussion where their mentor Sukhesh Arora, the founder of Yellowcat Theater, triggers their imagination to explore ideas and perform an array of short scenes in a matter of 15 minutes. And voila, they do!
Sukesh tells us, “This workshop will culminate into a performance, so today we are exploring some potential ideas. Our role as mentors is to help them explore ideas on their own and converge their creativity into a theatrical performance.
Hopefully, they will become our future audience, or you never know, in the long run we may get some performers out of them.”
“I regard the theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what it is to be a human being,” said Oscar Wilde.
As the group sat together reflecting upon the scenes, one could easily spot the manifestation of Oscar Wilde’s ideas. Unequivocally, the children decided that the scene in which a boy incessantly plays video games is the one that they could all relate to.
Without being didactic, Sukhesh subtly questioned them, “Does playing video games hamper your social life? Do you think that your parents are right when they stop you from doing it? What will happen to this character in the future?” Could there be a better way to make them learn life lessons?
Besides ‘Making it’, Yellowcat Theater will hold two other workshops: ‘Doing it’ and ‘Running it’ for theatre enthusiasts over 18 years of age and training classes for dedicated performers, respectively.