Thespo is held every December in Bombay where scores of participants under 25 years of age come together to organise a national theatre festival, stage full length productions, short performances in informal spaces, attend workshops, build bridges across different schools of theatre, find friendships across thousands of miles, learn about theatre/life/themselves and form a dynamic community of likeminded young individuals. At the end of the festival, as an added incentive, awards and cash prizes are presented in various acting, writing, directing and production categories.
Thespo is an initiative of TG Bombay and QTP –
Thespo is an initiative of TG Bombay and QTP –
Q Theatre Productions
Born in a classroom at St. Xavier’s College, Q Theatre Productions
(QTP) is completely a product of the student theatre system of Bombay. Now 12
years on, the core group is still the same with a few additions. At present the
group is run by Arghya, Christopher, Nadir, Varun, Vivek, Toral and Quasar along
with scores of volunteers and theatre enthusiasts floating in and out as and
when their schedule allows.
What began as a part-time activity grew to a passion, then an
obsession and now a profession. QTP is a full time theatre company that deals
in the various aspects of theatre—producing plays, production managing, conducting
workshops, curating festivals, promoting theatre, popularizing theatre through
an e-zine called The Script, providing technical assistance and even conducting
theatre activities for children who do not have access to creative outlets. QTP
also works to inspire the theatre loving youth of Bombay through their pet
project, Thespo, started in 1999.
In the last few years QTP has been part of many
international projects and collaborations which have taken them to the United
Kingdom, the United States, Italy, Australia, Canada,
etc. Four of QTP’s plays are still running on the local circuit - The President Is Coming, Project S.T.R.I.P., Nostalgia Brand Chewing Gum and Khatijabai
of Kamali Terrace.
While theatre’s dependence on sponsorships is a harsh
reality for all groups, QTP also specializes in corporate events to subsidize
their productions. Recent clients have included Microsoft, YPO, Hyatt Regency,
Manhattan Credit Cards, Sandoz, Cadbury’s, ICICI, Unilever and Tata Motors.
2011 has been an eventful year for QTP, who just completed
an international tour of Mind Walking with
Bandbaazi of the United Kingdom. QTP also organized the Laadli Media Awards,
Lakme Product Launch as well as TATA Literature Live!
Theatre Group Bombay
The Lucky Horseshoe Table
It
all began in the year 1941, when, in the midst of the chaos of World
War II, a passionate theatre-lover named Sultan Bobby Padamsee staged Macbeth. The
stage was then set for the creation of a new army, one far away from
the fronts of Germany. In 1944, Deryck Jeffereis, Jean Bhownagary and
Adi Marzban joined forces and together with Sultan Bobby Padamsee staged
plays such as Salome and Othello.
They were birds of a feather with scraggly beards, scruffy looks,
excellent playwriting and commendable performances. This marked the
beginning of Theatre Group (TG).
With
the unfortunate passing of Bobby Padamsee in 1946, Ebrahim Alkazi,
Dereck Jeffereis, Jamid Sayani and Alyque Padamsee commandeered TG to
new levels of excellence and liveliness. Legends such as Pearl Padamsee,
Gerson da Cunha, Vijay Crishna, Sabira Merchant joined to maintain the
TG mantra of delivering quality theatre in a creative way.
As
time passed, TG just kept getting stronger and more innovative. Scripts
were carefully read and painstakingly chosen to be produced: Equus, Candida, Jesus Christ Superstar, Tughlaq, Six Characters In Search of an Author, Arturo Ui, Three Sisters… One of their most risky productions was their 1969 production of Marat/Sade.
This performance was staged in the main hall at Xavier’s as the
audience looked on from the balconies. The actors, supposedly inmates
trying to escape from the asylum, climbed towards the audiences and
scared the living daylights out of them. To this day, laughter surrounds
the horseshoe table at Kulsum Terrace when the episode is mentioned in
passing at the AGM held there.
Trying
to come out of the mold of only performing the works of Western
playwrights, TG staged plays by Indian writers such as Partap Sharma (A Touch of Brightness, 1965), Girish Karnad (Tughlaq, 1970) and Mahesh Dattani (Tara,
1991). Their thirst for innovation also led to them to introduce the
use of stage lights and visual enactments during performances.
In
1966, The Sultan Padamsee Award for Playwriting was instituted by TG in
memory of Bobby Padamsee. The idea of award was to promote fresh
playwriting. Among the prominent winners havebeen Gurcharan Das with
Larins Saheb, Geive Patel with Princes, Dina Mehta with The Myth Makers
and Cyrus Mistry with Doongaji House. After a gap of over 2 decades, the
award returned this year.
The
Headquarters of TG is still Kulsum Terrace in Colaba, the home of
Bobby. Yearly AGMs are sill conducted around the large horseshoe table
in the drawing room, which is also the venue for unconventional staging
of plays like The Birthday Party (1973).
In its constant bid to innovate, TG created the Terrace Theatre, a
performance space built on the patio of Chotu Terrace in Colaba that
could seat 100 people. Besides these, venues such as Sundarbai Hall, Jai
Hind College Auditorium and BEST Hall were also roped in as staging
areas.
And
just when the world thought that TG could revolutionize no more, Thespo
was born in 1999. Thespo is a reminder that the future belongs to the
youth-those under 25 with a need to be on, behind, or lighting the
stage. Thespo looks out for the bold, brave and creative qualities of
its predecessors, including the scraggly beards.
TG
has been stretching limits and rethinking the tried and tested in
almost every sphere of the dramatic world, and will continue to do so
for as long as their lucky horseshoe table sticks around.
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