Who would have thought the National Theatre Hall of Shilpakala Academy would be packed with audience to the point of overflowing on the evening of the 23rd of September when Kalidasa’s masterpiece, Shakuntala, was brought to life by Samina Hussain Prema and her school of dance, Bhabna, blessed as it is with a group of talented artists? With words of encouragement from Asaduzzaman Noor, the cultural affairs minister, and Kamal Lohani, one of our preeminent cultural personalities, the dance drama began with captivating lighting and stage decoration that took the audience deep into a forest where the story is set.
The dance drama depicts the story of Shakuntala, played by Prema, founder of Bhabna and dance director of the production. Shakuntala was a maiden at the hermitage of Kanva, the most revered sage, into the heart of the forest. Dushyanta, king of Hastinapura, played by Shukomal Iftekher Kakon, arrives at the hermitage while hunting a male deer down. There he meets Shakuntala and instantly falls in love with her. His love is reciprocated and they get married according to the Gandharva system of marriage. The king presents her with his ring as a token of his love and promise that he would come back for her.
While Shakuntala mourns the king's absence, she is visited by a sage, Durvasa, who feels utterly ignored by her, lost as she has been in her daydreams. Angered by her negligence, Durvasa curses that Dushyanta will forget his wife’s existence. Shakuntala decides to visit her husband in court and show him the ring, which unfortunately she loses in a river during her journey. The ring, however, is found by some fishermen, one of whom hands it over to the king. The king, stricken with shock and curiosity, then comes to his senses and goes on a quest to find his young son, and is reunited with Shakuntala.
Although there was a slight technical hiccup at the beginning, the sailing was smooth from there on. While the different dance forms were mostly dominated by Manipuri, a number of classical dance forms were also incorporated. The change in mood or storyline was conveyed through dance performances and the perfect synchronisation among the dancers made them effortless. Anyone would agree that Prema left no stone unturned to make the choreography as striking as possible, which her team of dancers delivered almost impeccably.
What made the play even more outstanding was the music directed and composed by Sumon Sarkar. Renowned artistes, Priyanka Gope and Khairul Anam Shakil, were the key singers, with Sirsho Roy and Sumon Sarkar participating in some songs. The use of Nazrul's songs, in an effort to weld classical songs with Nazrul's, was certainly worth an experiment.
The script was written by Alomay Biswas and the costumes, designed by Tahsina Shahin, were vibrant and captured the essence of the play with absolute perfection. The spectacular stage, designed by Kazi Kalam, made the ambience suitable to the story's setting. One particular scene, among many others, deserves a noteworthy mention, where Shakuntala’s memories with the king were highlighted through shadows dancing in the background of the stage. It was creative and enthralling at the same time.
While much of the storyline was conveyed through dance performances or their shifts, background narration played a vital role in the development of the plot. The deep-voiced narrations were wonderfully done by actor Jayanto Chattopadhyay, and distinguished artistes Dahlia Ahmed, Shimul Mustapha, Tamanna Tithi and Debashish Chakrabortty and Jayonta Das. The light designer Reaz Mahmud and set and props designer Hadi Mirza who sang the choruses also deserve to be mentioned for their incredible work in making the drama a success.
The female dance performances owe their vibrancy to Naziba Basher, Rawnak Nowrin Haque, Moumita Dey, Israt Jahan Eva, among others, and the male performances to Imon Ahmed, Emdadul Haque Milon and Antor Sarker, among others.
The audience was clearly hooked to the show till the very end. One could argue, however, that the scene capturing Shakuntala's melancholy when she was cursed was not well built given it was a very important part of the story. In spite of a few flaws such as this, one has to admit it was a great start for Bhabna and we hope the dance school, under the guidance of Prema, will go forward shining all the way down.
The writer is an undergrad student of Business Administration at North South University, Bangladesh.