मराठी रंगभूमी

Marathi Theatre: A Glimpse into its Illustrious Past

Preface

This booklet showcases the historical developments of various trends and events that helped in the making of the Marathi Theatre.

Although this theatre was strongly influenced by the Bengali, Parsi and English Theatres , the approach this theatre had towards entertainment was well suited for the audience of the region of Maharashtra.

In this booklet the key moments in the history of the evolution of this theatre have been highlighted and the importance and appreciation that it gets even in today’s world, across all generations has been showcased.

Introduction

Early references date back to the 1st century cave inscriptions at Nashik by Gautami Balashri, the mother of Satavahan ruler Gautamiputra Satakarni . They mention him organizing Utsava and Samaja forms of theatrical entertainment for his subjects.

The tradition of the modern marathi theatre dates back to 15th-16th century, when Sarfoji Raje Bhosle of Thanjavur (Shivaji Maharaj’s cousin) used to write plays in Telugu and Marathi. These plays are still preserved in the Saraswati Mahal Library in Thanjavur. Controversy over whether they can be called as the first plays in the history of Marathi Theatre was created as the place where the plays were performed are quite far from Maharashtra and the styles/ traditions have not been continued there.

The onset and inspiration of the first plays of the theatre is reportedly from the Kannada stage, from a folk-form named ‘Yakshagana’ . The theatre started performing Sangeet Natak. From the kirtan tradition came the music, the dashavatar brought the enactment and the Kannada plays got the costumes and staging techniques. All this lead to Vishnudas Bhave creating the first marathi play to be accepted by the audience - Sita Svayamvar.

Onset of the Modern Marathi Theatre

In 1843, a puppetier from Sangli, Maharashtra, Vishnudas Bhave staged the first unscripted Sangeet Natak (musical play) - Sita Svayamvar . He first saw a performance of Yakshagana when it was staged a Maharashtra and was inspired by it to start a similar tradition for and by the Marathi-speaking community.

Borrowing staging techniques and costume design from the Kannada plays and adding songs to the enactment, Bhave created an environment similar to Yakshagana and produced Sita Svayamvar.

Looking at his dedication and desire to create an artform like this for the people, The Maharaja of Sangli Chintamanrao Appa Saheb Patwardhan commisioned his work which helped Bhave take his plays all over Maharashtra. He formed the Sanglikar Natak Company and toured the entire state, performing plays based on mythological narratives. They had no written scripts, only tales which was already known to the audience. The enactment of the little details in the stories and the exaggeration of some was attractive to the people. They started incorporating a lot of sword-fighting and war scenes performed by trained swordsmen which became very popular.

On the same lines as Bhave, was Jyotiba Phule also known as Mahatma Phule who wrote the first Marathi political play- Tritiyaratna .

In 1880, Saubhadra , the first scripted marathi musical play written by Annasaheb Kirloskar , was performed in Pune. In 1907, Krishnaji Prabhakar Khadilkar , a disciple of Lokmanya Tilak , wrote and staged a play criticising the tyrant rule of Lord Curzon in West Bengal. It was called Kichakavadh i.e.

‘Killing of Kichaka’ , based on the mythological tale of Draupadi, Bhima , and Kichaka, commented caustically on Lord Curzon’s oppressive rule . It was banned till 1916 describing it as seditious.

Marathi society loves songs, especially classical music, hence the melodious combination of music and drama that Annasaheb Kirloskar’s plays brought to the theatre was tremendously in demand. He saw Parsi plays and observed that the characters were singing thier own songs. In Vishnudas Bhave’s plays, there was a different choir which sang the songs. After this observation, being able to sing became a necessary quality in a person interested in acting in one of his plays.

Nandi being performed in the beginning of Sangeet Natak

Sangeet Natak

Sangeet Natak in Marathi language literally means Musical Drama. As the name suggests, this form of drama combines prose as well as poetry in form of songs to convey the story. In a manner, they are very much similar to Musicals. The dramatic music used in these is known as ‘Natya Sangeet’ which is one of the two popular forms of vocal arts in Maharashtra and surrounding states, the other being Bhavageet (literally ‘emotion poetry’ ).

People from all over the country, who were unknown to Marathi language, came to watch these musicals. The theatre companies portrayed the story so well through use of various tunes and melodies to create an environment, that there was no language barrier for the audience. This field of theatre was dominated by great artists like Bal Gandharva, Deenanath Mangeshkar and Vasantrao Deshpande .

An important tradition of ‘nandi’ or overture was observed by all marathi plays. It was basically an orchestral piece of music, praising the Lord Natraja, performed before the play started. In earlier dramas, nandi used to be done behind the curtains/before the curtains were opened, after which the narrator would give a brief about what the play depicts/gave a context to the play. Once during a performance of one the plays by the Kirloskar Natak Company , the curtains were mistakenly opened at the wrong time and the nandi going on behind the curtains was revealed. The people saw the narrator, actors and singers performing it with the various puja vessels and flowers in their hands and found it very amusing. They found that it being done in front of the audience would have a welcoming and completely different effect on their viewing of the play. Hence they started performing nandi in front of the audience.