JOIN USLockdown stories come alive on stage
Covid lockdowns have become new wellsprings of creativity for the big screen, OTT platforms and theatre persons on the lookout for new ideas and plots. Actor and director Lillete Dubey has adapted a book by Shobha De into a play. Titled ‘Lockdown Liaisons’, the play will be staged at Chowdiah Memorial Hall on March 9 at 7 pm. It will have five stories knit into one play.
Presented by FLO Bangalore in association with The Prime Time Theatre, the play explores the fragility of human relationships in a collection of short stories that trace the subtle world of emotions as they are redefined within the four walls of the home.
“I am not a fan of online theatre because theatre is essentially an interactive medium and what works like magic is the synergy between the actors and the audience. The planning started towards the end of 2020, but I was mulling over it because Covid was coming and going in waves and we didn’t know when we would be able to perform for a live audience,” Lillete tells Showtime, ahead of the play.
Directed by Lillete Dubey, the cast includes Ira Dubey, an actor and Joy Sengupta, who has acted in over 30 films and has performed on stage for over two decades.
The production has five short stories. It begins with the story of a lazy husband in ‘Vodka and no Tonic’, and moves on to migrant labour woes in ‘Leaving’, a young couple finding their marriage unravelling in ‘A Quest Ends’, a story of a woman who has suffered multiple whammies in ‘A whiff of eternity’. The final play, ‘The Lockdown Funeral’, looks at a bitter divorced woman recalling her life with her ex-husband.
Lillete explains, “The first story is about a young couple whose marriage is falling apart during the lockdown. The wife suddenly finds her husband very annoying. The format here is a monologue. The second story is about a couple who have been trying to have a child for seven years. They have a great life in Mumbai, but childlessness is a worrying factor. The third story has Ira portraying an overweight girl who worked in Delhi but was forced to return to her parents in Delhi because of the lockdown. The return forces her to take a relook at her life.”
The exodus of migrant workers when the pandemic broke out was a worrying sight. Lillete has captured the emotions and trauma that came with it in the fourth play. It looks at the life of a construction worker, played by Joy. “We trace the life of a construction worker who is in a dilemma whether to return to his family or stay. It’s a strong and moving play because he is married with two children, but falls in love with a pretty widow, who happens to be his co-worker. Should he stay with her or leave?” explains Lillete.
The last play, performed by Lillete herself, is about an older woman who loses her husband during the lockdown. “They had a great marriage and belong to the upper echelons of society. They were rich, cultured and sophisticated. But everything fell apart when her husband, after ten years of marriage, sought divorce because he falls in love with another woman. This changes everything for the couple, especially the first wife,” says Lillete.