Committed to PEOPLE'S RIGHT TO KNOW
Vol. 4 Num 348 Sat. May 22, 2004  
   
Culture


Achievement
An institute of theatre education
Certificate giving ceremony of Theatre School


Theatre School, an institute to provide education on theatre, recently arranged a certificate giving ceremony at the Mahila Samiti Hall The recipients were the successful participants of the one-year course.

Professor Kabir Chawdhury was the chair while journalist Fayez Ahmed was the chief guest of the programme.

In the discussion session Ramendu Majumdar, the General Secretary of the school informed the audience about the activities and the aim of Theatre School. Ramendu said, 'Established in 1990, Theatre School has been providing theatre education for 14 years. In this period, 14 batches have completed the 1-year course on practical as well as theoretical knowledge on theatre. Kabir Chawdhury is the Principal while Abdullah Al Mamun is the Vice-Principal and Khurshid Alam is the Superintendent of the school.'

Theatre personality Ataur Rahman said, 'After completing a course on theatre no one should expect to become a promising director, actor or designer unless he or she has deep roots in this medium. But, theatre education can help a person to become a rational being.'

Faez Ahmed said, 'It is really appreciable that in a poor country like Bangladesh, the Theatre School is providing education on theatre.'

The chairperson Professor Kabir Chawdhury said to the participants of the course, 'To become a perfect theatre worker everybody should work jointly as a theatre group and struggle to reach perfection.'

After the speech, the successful trainees staged Roktakta Prantor, a play set against the backdrop of the Panipat War, by Muneir Chawdhury. The director of the play Kamaluddin Kabir said, 'Many directors have presented Roktakta Prantor earlier. I have edited the play to give it a contemporary touch. That is why some historical characters in the play like Ahmed Shah Abdali is not only a mere character, rather he represents the imperialistic tendency of the some of the contemporary superpowers, who always try to invade the weaker nations for their personal interests.'

As a director Kamaluddin Kabir could not distribute the blocking of the characters effectively on a huge vertical set. However, he was successful in the case of the characterisation of the performers.

The audience were seated at the three sides of the huge vertical arena stage on the hall. Instructed by Kamaluddin Kabir, Ahmed Zubaer's set design was simple but effective to support the theme of the play.

Light designer Nasirul Haque Khokon's design was simple. However, the using of the symbolic colour effect on the cyclorama (back curtain used in proscenium stage) on an arena stage was not effective as all the characters of the play performed at centre of the stage and the audience could not follow the colour effect on cyclorama at the corner of the stage. Khokon said, 'Because of the lack of technical show, we could not coordinate well.'

The performance of the artistes was not impressive.

Picture
A scene from the play Raktakto Prantor