Unrequited and unfulfilled love stories

Amrita Pritam spoke openly about her affection for lyricist and poet Sahir Ludhianvi. Their story of unrequited love is timeless in today’s time as the passionate hearts always long for love and acceptance. Similarly, the turbulent married life of Guru Dutt and Geeta Dutt has been open for interpretations, since the filmmaker never openly acknowledged his alleged relationship with actress Waheeda Rehman.

These two intense and emotionally charged tales, Mumbai-based playwright Saif Hyder Hasan has made into successful plays that will be staged in the capital during the weekend, after garnering positive response from Mumbai’s theatre corridors.

Playing Sahir and Amrita in the play Ek Mulaqat are Shekhar Suman and Deepti Naval who meet on a cold winter night in Delhi on the terrace in the Punjabi author’s house.

There is soul-sharing conversation between the two of them, reflecting the deeper relationship they share. In Gardish Mein Taare, playing the main lead are Arif Zakaria and Sonali Kulkarni and the story revolves around the lives of two creative people and their work.

Through its fictional characters Devdutt Bose (Zakaria) and Bhavana (Kulkarni), the narrative gives the audience a peek into their tumultuous marriage and, suggests that when two highly creative and talented artistes fall in love, their union usually ends on a tragic note. It depicts their pain, pathos, magic, music and love in the relationship.

“It is not based on Guru Dutt’s life but is inspired by some incidents. But I found a love story there as well. We all love stories and I am talking about the more sustained ones where the emotions are at a very mature level,” Hasan tells Metrolife.

“The characters, we are talking about, are man and woman and it is not a boy-girl love story. It is about a dysfunctional marriage and still there is a love story. If you
look at Guru Dutt’s letters that he has written to Geeta (Dutt), there is acknowledgement of that marriage gone wrong but there is a sense of deep affection in those letters,” he adds.

It is these letters that have found a space in the play and using these letters the narrative of the play moves forward. “We have used the letter concept. There is a suicide
in the beginning and then the story moves forward through letters.”

Interestingly, the plays are musical romantic productions, though Hasan insists that calling them as musicals is “misnomer”.

“It is the treatment which matters and when any subject comes to my mind, I start working on the music. So the script and the music develop parallely,” he says.

For Ek Mulaqat, which recently completed 25 shows, Hasan has taken nazams and original poetry of Ludhianvi and Pritam, along with popular songs like Chalo ek baar phir se and Abhi na jao chhod kar.

The two period dramas, a part of the trilogy, would be staged on September 19 and 20 at FICCI Auditorium.