Year Ender 2018

There are plays of various genres being staged in Mumbai, and at least a handful of them take up social issues. The cause of women and the underprivileged find are most popular with theatre-makers. They may not come under the classification of the best plays of the year, and some may not mention a cause directly, but audiences are free to read between the lines.

A pick of ten plays seen in 2018, that raised a pertinent issues:

1. A Farming Story

Faezeh Jalali, directed this play by Vineet Bhalla, that won the Sultan Padamsee Playwriting award in 2016. It is set in a dystopian future, where 'hummals' or human animals farm lands run by a harsh 'Estate' managed by humans, profiting from the labour of hummals, who have run up a debt that they cannot pay and fomenting trouble using the presence of starving 'outsiders' seeking shelter in the village.

2. Baby's Blues

Post-partum depression is seldom spoken about in the media, and almost never in theatre. Ila Arun and KK Raina directed this production of Tammy Ryan’s play about this sensitive subject, with Dilnaz Irani’s brilliant performance as a new mother suffering from this terrifying condition, and Ankur Rathee as her supportive but hapless husband.

3. Gaa Re Maa

The play about music, passion, mother and sons written by Adhir Bhat and Siddharth Kumar from Ishitta Arun’s story, directed by Anahita Uberoi, brings together singer-actresses Bharati Achrekar and Suneeta Rao to build cultural bridges with the power of music, without waving any obvious flags.

4. Harus Marus

Winner of the Hindi playwriting competition organized by Sanhita Manch, Harus Marus, written by Mukesh Nema, and directed by Rasika Agashe, speaks up for poor, exploited farm workers, whose lives are worse off that the rats that populate the grain warehouse in a feudal village.

5. Hello Farmaish

Yuki Ellias directs Sneh Sapru’s play about a bunch of women in rural Haryana, who get inspired by Kalpana Chawla’s space flight, and take over a local radio station to share stories of science and hope. The play, based on a real life community radio station, makes a case for women finding a way of battling rampant patriarchy in the state—as famous for its sportswomen as it is notorious for female infanticide.

6. Lost Paradise

Jodhpur-based group Abhinay Gurukul staged a play called Lost Paradise, directed by Aru and Swati Vyas, during the Theatre Olympics, about the suffering of Kashmiri Pandits forced out of their homes by militants, and made to face apathetic government officials in charge of providing help and relief.

7. Pashmina

Pashmina, written by Mrinal Mathur, and directed by Sajida, also a winner of Sanhita Manch’s playwriting competition is a serene and moving piece about an elderly couple going to Kashmir, where their only son, a soldier was killed. The play talks about the devastation of Kashmir by militancy, the forced eviction of the Pandits and the young lives needlessly lost.

8. Poster

Shankar Shesh’s play about the revolt of tribals against the exploitation of feudal lords, directed by Ajit Bhagat, had young actors of the group Aavishkar bring their energy into the production of an old classic.

9. Samajswasthya

Atul Pethe directed this stirring Marathi play by Ajit Dalvi, and played the fiery social reformer, whose ahead-of-the-times writings on birth control and sexual freedom for women, had him hauled to court multiple times on charges of obscenity, for one of which Dr Ambedkar defended him.

10. Sangeet Devbabhali

Female bonding in a spiritual packaging in Prajakt Deshmukh’s soulful Marathi musical, about the unlikely sisterhood of Sant Tukaram’s neglected wife Avali, and Lakhubai, the equally disgruntled wife of his idol Lord Vithoba, with Shubhangi Sadavarte and Manasi Prabhakar Joshi’s mellifluous voices singing some great abhangs.