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Acclaimed playwright/Director Ashish Pathak featured in Natrang’s National Theatre Talk Show
Kashmir Times. Dated: 6/27/2021 10:45:39 PM
‘Knowledge comes through experience’ says Ashish Pathak in Natrang’s National Theatre Talk show
KT NEWS SERVICE
JAMMU, June 27: Natrang’s National Theatre Talk Show, ‘Young Voices of Theatre’ featured Theatre director, writer and acting teacher, Ashish Pathak today who shared his views with the global audience at the Facebook page of Natrang Jammu. Director Natrang, Balwant Thakur informed that this unique talk show is featuring acclaimed young voices of theatre spread across the country who have earned a distinctive name for themselves as actors, directors, designers or technicians through their outstanding contribution in the field of contemporary theatre and this effort of Natrang has enliven theatre activity in India which otherwise was almost put at unpredictable halt because of Corona crisis.
Ashish Pathak a prolific writer, director, acting teacher and founder of Samagam Rangmandal, Jabalpur, has written more than 15 Plays including ‘Agarbatti’, ‘Red Frock’, ‘Popcorn’ and ‘Dakait Chuhe’ etc. He has also written more than 20 short Stories and directed more than 20 plays including his own written plays along with ‘Agni aur Barkha’ by Girish Karnad, ‘Birjis Qadar ka Kunba’ by Federico Garcia Lorca, ‘Vasaansi Jeernani’ by Mahesh Elkunchvar, ‘Saray’ by Vijaydan Detha, ‘Puntila’ by Brecht in Kannada that has been performed in almost every State of the Country. Active in Theatre for more than 20 years, Ashish has been invited as guest faculty for play writing, direction, acting and as a speaker by a number of institutions and groups like NSD (Pune Workshop), Rangayana (Mysore), M P S D (convocation), Raza Foundation, P S M College and many more. Four of his scripts have been published as well including; ‘Agarbatti’ by Vaani Publications. Ashish is the first artist from Madhya Pradesh to receive the Mahindra Excellence Award in Theatre for Best Original Script (Agarbatti). He has also got the best Folk Art Master Award, Sanhita Manch Puruskar and many more.
In an interesting conversation with Nartang’s senior artist Neeraj Kant, Ashish narrated his journey of theatre which started through youth-fests in his college days. He was so much engrossed by the influence of theatre that he left a lucrative job to pursue full time theatre as he felt that if he does not do theatre, he would not do justice to himself. Having a realisation that theatre requires a lot of training and he is not formally trained in it, he learnt a lot from personal efforts through training workshops and also through discussions with trained friends. He also learnt a lot and enriched himself from positive criticism from his well-wishers. Ashish has written several popular plays on different topics which reflect different shades of life and one may easily find versatility in his writings. Ashish believes that formal training in theatre plays a vital role in shaping one’s personality and to make the training more meaningful, he suggests that theatre training institutes should collaborate with each other and share their best practices. Speaking about his process of writing, he asserts that though art is not mathematics, it still has some calculations behind it and he works on the same through his experience and imagination. He endeavours to understand the psychology of both the actor and the character so that a relevant cord is touched. Having an opinion that a person’s personality becomes part of his/her art, Ashish tries to find the relation between life and art. He also shares that he prefers writing fiction in which he himself creates his characters. Speaking about the present time of the Corona crisis, which was beyond our control, he suggests that though it has caused a major setback to art and artists, still one may keep his patience intact and equip himself/herself for the point when this crisis is over. Moreover, patience is the basic ingredient of theatre.
Natrang’s dedicated team which is managing this National event includes Neeraj Kant, Anil Tickoo, Sumeet Sharma, Sanjeev Gupta, Vikrant Sharma, Mohd Yaseen, Brijesh Avtar Sharma, Gauri Thakur and Chander Shekhar. Sangeet Natak Akademi’s Ustad Bismillah Khan Yuva Awardee, theatre actor, director and trainer, Sumeet Sharma would be featured in this talk show on 28th of June, 2021.