The stage adaptation of Parsai’s take on Hindi cinema in the 70s, ‘Golden Jubilee’ is an entertaining musical and a celebration of nostalgia.
Mumbai’s city-based theatre group ‘D for Drama’ bring us their most ambitious production as they decide to adapt Harishankar Parsai’s ‘Ek Film Katha’ and bring it to life on stage.Â
The play ‘Golden Jubilee’ is a stage adaptation of Parsai’s satirical take on the Hindi cinema industry of the 70s. It is an entertaining musical that celebrates the nostalgia of the 70s cinema and its stage stars.Â
Saurabh Nayyar, co-founder of the theatre group and the director of ‘Golden Jubilee’ talked about the process of putting together the play. He said the play aims to look at the 70s cinema period in a fun way. For the production, he developed Parasi’s Short story into a full-fledged play. The dialogues and songs are written by him and the narrator uses the author’s lines.
The story talks about situations that occur as a writer explains the plot of a film to an actor with diminishing popularity. While the writer promises that the film was going to help the actor regain his popularity, the latter imagines himself playing out those scenes and ruling the box office once again.
The play recreates numerous stock scenes popular back in the day. For example, when the hero is weak, the heroin cries out the name of god for his well-being and it miraculously works.
Most of the scenes in Parsai’s play have been shown in the play, while there are some additions of new characters too.
Nayyar first wrote the songs while working on the adaptation. The seven songs composed by Shridhar Nagraj are heavily inspired by popular compositions of RD Burman and OP Nayyar.
With over 20 members, the ensemble consists of two professional singers apart from singer-actors and in-cast musicians.
Older people in the audience, above 60, will love the music says Nayyar. His theatrical journey began in Jabalpur with musical plays. He has been a part of two popular musical plays- Piya Beherupiya and Stories in Song.
The play tries its best to reflect the 70s. It includes the vibes of the period with the help of costumes and storytelling. Cinema then had a certain simplicity to it, even romance. Like in the film Mere Mehboob (1963), two characters collide and their books fall down and we can sense a spark between them. People might call it cliche but it was the simplicity of that period. The pay uses shadow puppetry to create visual effects.
The play received a great response at the Prithvi Theatre.
One of ‘D for Drama’s’ previous works is Patna Ka Superhero. It is a solo one-act play that reminds the audience of all that is lost in making a metro city a home.
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