This play is for nature

In a world that keeps inching steadily towards an environmental catastrophe, can we afford to have a limited number of conservationists fighting a battle on everyone's behalf? Or, should teachers, doctors, engineers, lawyers, artistes and other professionals be their own environmentalists? When author Amitav Ghosh made a strong case for the latter in a podcast around two years ago, asking listeners if their work features concern for nature, Bengaluru-based theatre director Aruna Ganesh Ram got thinking. Her immersive theatre company, Visual Respiration, had produced performances on gender, memory, food and traditional games, but not so much on the environment.

Aruna Ganesh Ram

"That was the trigger for me to start engaging with the subject," recalls Aruna about her team's research that began in July 18. "We did a lot of reading — books by Vandana Shiva, Rachel Carson, David Attenborough and Robin Kimmermer guided us along the way. We had insightful conversations with Bittu Sahgal and Prerna Singh Bindra. And all the questions that we grappled with found their way into the performance," she adds. Under Pressure, a theatrical piece devised by Deepika Chauhan, Asha Ponikiewska and Aditya Garg, which Aruna has directed, premiered in Bengaluru in January. It makes its Mumbai debut this Friday.

The performance explores our relationship with nature in three parts

The performance combines poetry, movement and storytelling, and explores the human bond with nature through multiple perspectives. Divided into three segments, the first part depicts the 385-million-year-old existence of trees on earth. "There is a poem called Aam by Gulzar that he graciously allowed us to use. It speaks of his relationship with a tree he grew up playing beneath. It reminded me of how climbing trees was a part of my childhood, while my son plays on the manicured lawns of a gated community," shares Aruna.

The second segment brings in multiple players in the environment narrative — the rag picker, capitalist, journalist and consumerist — through a language of gestures and masks. "When it comes to caring for nature, everyone is on a different journey. While some of us are conscious of composting waste, others keep it at the level of switching off fans when not in use. But we are all battling systems that function to make us buy more than we need," explains Aruna.

The final part, titled Polymer, is centered on the plastic problem. "Through puppetry and movement, we create a dystopian world that urges the audience to take a moment and think of the fact that since the time [the first bit of] plastic entered our planet, it hasn't left," she adds.

Fittingly, the play uses a set made of upcycled plastic, while also swapping theatre lights for regular lighting. With the action unfolding in close proximity of the audience, they often come away overwhelmed by the state of environmental destruction we have reached, Aruna says. "The information we present is not new. But has all the talk on climate change left us cold? As practitioners of the live medium of theatre, the idea is to be one spoke in the larger wheel of conversation."

ON June 28 and 29, 8 pm
AT The Cuckoo Club, 5AA, Pali Hill Road, Bandra West.
LOG ON TO insider.in
Entry Rs 400

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