Theatre of India
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Theatre of India began with the Rigvedic dialogue hymns during the Vedic period, and Sanskrit drama was established as a distinct art form in the last few centuries BC. During the Middle Ages, the Indian subcontinent was invaded a number of times. This played a major role in shaping of Indian culture and heritage. Medieval India experienced a grand fusion with the invaders from the Middle East and Central Asia. British India, as a colony of the British Empire, used theatre as one of its instruments in protest. To resist, the British Government had to impose "Dramatic Performance Act" in 1876. From the last half of the 19th century, theatres in India experienced a boost in numbers and practice.
After Indian independence in 1947, theatres spread throughout India as one of the means of entertainment. India, being a multi-cultural nation, cannot be associated with a unique trend and feature in its theatres. Presently, major threats to Indian theatre are the spread of the television industry and the spread of films produced in the Indian film industry based in Mumbai (formerly Bombay), known as "Bollywood". Lack of finance is another major trouble.
[edit] History of Indian theatre
[edit] Theatre in ancient India
Indian drama dates back to the Rigvedic dialogue hymns in the Vedic period. Drama was later established as a distinct art form in the last few centuries BC. Bharata Muni wrote Natya Shastra (ca. 200 BC - 200 AD), a dissertation on the structure and purpose of theatre in society. Some of the most famous playwrights in ancient Sanskrit drama included Śudraka, Bhāsa, Kalidasa and Dandi.
Also see Classical Indian dance.
[edit] Theatre in medieval India
[edit] Theatre in India under British rule
[edit] Indian theatre after Independence (1947-1992)
[edit] Contemporary (post-1992) Indian theatre
[edit] Improvization
[edit] Notable theatres in India in different Indian languages and regions
- Bengali Theatre
- Urdu Theatre
[edit] Notable people
[edit] Ancient Age
[edit] Medieval age
[edit] Under British rule
- Dinabandhu Mitra
- Michael Madhusudan Dutta
- Rabindranath Tagore
- Bharatendu Harishchandra
- Jaishankar Prasad
[edit] After Independence (1947 onwards)
Notable theatre directors
- Veenapani Chawla
- Prithviraj Kapoor
- Ebrahim Alkazi
- Ramesh Mehta
- Habib Tanvir
- Bansi Kaul
- Ratan Thiyam
- Suresh Bhardwaj
- Safdar Hashmi
- S. M. Azhar Alam
- Utpal Dutta
- Shankar Nag
- K.V. Subbanna
- B.V. Karanth
- K.V. Akshara
- Sambhu Mitra
- Prasanna
- Chandradasan
- Sachin Gupta
- Rudraprasad Sengupta
- Sk. Ahmad
- Shafi Inamdar
- Mahandra Joshi
- Satyadev Dubey
- Bijon Bhattacharya
- Mohan Maharishi
- Gursharan Singh
- Arvind Gaur
- Ram Gopal Bajaj
- B.M. Shah
- Naseeruddin Shah
- Rohini Hattangadi
- Mujeeb Khan
- Abhijeet Choudhary
- Rudradeep Chakrovarty
[edit] Notable playwrights
- Mahesh Dattani
- Rambriksh Benipuri
- Ramesh Mehta
- Girish Karnad
- Vijay Tendulkar
- Badal Sarkar
- Swadesh Deepak
- Bhisham Sahni
- Dharamvir Bharati
- Mahesh Elkunchwar
- Mohan Rakesh
- Habib Tanvir
- Govind Deshpande
- Sharad Joshi
- Dr. Narendra Mohan
- Asghar Wajahat
- Manjula Padmanabhan
- Javed Siddiqui
- Rajesh Joshi
- Hrishikesh Sulabh
- B.M. Shah
- Partap Sharma
- Abhay singhai
- Mujeeb Khan
- Dina Mehta
- Poile Sengupta
- Asif Currimbhoy
- Gurucharan Das
- Puneet Sharma
[edit] Forms of Indian theatre
[edit] Classical Indian dance
The most orthodox and complex form of musical theatre based on the Natya Shastra.
[edit] Traditional Indian theatre
See Guru Padma Shri Mani Madhava Chakyar, Mani Damodara Chakyar and Kutiyattam
[edit] Indian folk theatre
Bhavai (Strolling Players) is a popular folk theatre form of Gujarat, while Jatra has been popular in Bengal, another folk theatre form popular in Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Malwa region of Madhya Pradesh, is Swang, which dialogue-oriented rather than movement-oriented.
yakshagana is a very popular theatre art in Karnataka. It is semi-classical in nature and involves music and songs based on carnatic music, rich costumes, story line based on Mahabharat and Ramayana. This theatre version also involves dialogue in between songs and that gives it a folk art flavor.
[edit] Modern Indian theatre
[edit] Indian puppet theatre
Yakshagana is a popular Semi-classical theatre art from costal Karnataka. This art involves rich costume, music, dance and dialogue. Puppet shows in parts of Karnataka uses all these elements of yakshagana to depict Ramayana and Mahabharata stories.
See article on Yakshagana Puppetry and visit http://www.yakshaganapuppets.com/pages/bhaskar.htm
[edit] Indian street theatre
[edit] Other Indian theatres
[edit] Notable awards and festivals
[edit] Awards
- Sangeet Natak Akademi Award
- Theatre Pasta Theatre Awards,[1]
- Kalidas Samman
- Karmaveer Puraskaar Noble Laureates,Artistes for Change
[edit] Festivals
- Nandikar's National Theatre Festival
- Prem Utsav festival of veteran Indian Writer Shri Munshi Premchand's plays
[edit] Institutional aids in Indian theatre
[edit] Notable groups and companies
- Nandikar
- Ninasam
- Rangayana
- Ranga Shankara
- Prithvi Theatre
- Dramanon
- Indian People's Theatre Association
- Chilsag Chillies Theatre Company
- Theatre Formation Paribartak
- Masquerade (Theatre Group)
- DramaTech
[edit] Notable productions
- Oedipus (1982)
- Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1984)
- Savitri (1989)
- Ganapati (1999)
- Oh God (2006)
- Odd Couple (2006)
- ART (2007)
- Five point someone (2007)
- Run For Your Wife (2007)
[edit] Notable stages
- Academy of Fine Arts, Calcutta (Ranu Mukherjee Mancha)
- Rabindra Sadan
[edit] Notable theatre to films
- Sohrab Modi
- Prithviraj Kapoor
- Om Shivpuri
- Kulbhushan Kharbanda
- Sudha Shivpuri
- Om Shivpuri
- Anupam Kher
- Raj Babbar
- Ashish Vidyarthi
- Alok Nath
- Neena Gupta
- Rajpal Yadav
- Aishwarya Rai
- Seema Biswas
- Meghna Kothari
- Satish Kaushik
- Suresh Bhardwaj
- Deepa Sahi
- Ratna Pathak Shah
- Pankaj Kapoor
- Kangana Ranawat
- Dia Mirza
- Lara Dutta
- Priyanka Chopra
- Celina Jaitley
- Sushmita Sen
- Bipasha Basu
- Rani Mukherjee
- Kajol
- Amrita Rao
- Esha Deol
- Preity Zinta
- Amisha Patel
- Madhuri Dixit
- Deepika Padukone
- Katrina Kaif
- Riya Sen
- Juhi Chawla
- Isha Koppikar
- Sneha Ullal
- Bhumika Chawla
- Akshay Kumar
- Shahid Kapoor
- Hritik Roshan
- Paresh Rawal
- Abhishek Bachchan
- Sunil Shetty
- Vivek Oberoi
- John Abraham
- Amitabh Bachchan
- Ritesh Deshmukh
- Aftab Shivdasani
- Arjun Rampal
- Ajay Devgan
- Zayed Khan
- Shabana Azmi
- Sandeep Marwah
- Shilpa Shukla
- Shahrukh Khan
- Girish Karnad
- Ananth Nag
- Shankar Nag
- Rajkumar
- G V Iyer
- Piyush Mishra
- Kangana Ranaut
- Pasupathy
- Deepak Dobriyal
[edit] Training
[edit] Further reading
- The Indian theatre, by Mulk Raj Anand, Published by D. Dobson, 1950.
- Theatre in India, by Balwant Gargi. Published by Theatre Arts Books, 1962.
- A panorama of theatre in India, by Som Benegal. Published by Popular Prakashan [for] Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR), 1968.
- Indian Theatre: Traditions of Performance, by Farley P. Richmond, Darius L. Swann, Phillip B. Zarrilli. Motilal Banarsidass Publ., 1993. ISBN 8120809815.
- Indian theatre: theatre of origin, theatre of freedom, by Ralph Yarrow. Routledge, 2001. ISBN 070071412X.
- The Oxford companion to Indian theatre, by Ananda Lal. Oxford University Press, 2004. ISBN 0195644468.
[edit] References
- ^ Worldwide theatre award. "Theatre Pasta Award information". http://www.chilsagchillies.com/pastaawards/index.html. Retrieved on 22 December 2008.
[edit] External links
| Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Theater of India |
- National School of Drama, NSD
- AKS
- Koothu p pattarai
- mukhOsh
- Bangalore Theatre Guide
- Asmita Theatre
- Prithvi Theatre
- Sopanam Institute of Performing Arts and Research (Bhashabharathi), Kerala
- Adishakti theatre
- Samooh Theatre
- Natarang Pratishthan: Archive and Resource Centre for Indian Theatre
- Ideal Drama and Entertainment Academy (IDEA) Mumbai
- Abhinaya Theatre Research Centre
- Swatantra Theatre (Pune)

