Kanjush belongs to the genre--Comedy of Morals, which is designed to ridicule and correct the vices like hypocrisy, pride, avarice, social pretensions, simony and nepotism. Kanjush is a translated play of Moliere who is the supreme playwright in this genre.

Usually, Moilere's plays are full of farce and satire. His drama The Miser attacks the hypocrisy, greediness, dishonesty and opportunist tendency of the elite class of the society through the story of a miser.

Tariq Anam Khan's adaptation of Moliere's The Miser presents the protagonist as a Dhakaia (an inhabitant of the Old Dhaka city) rich old man named Haider Ali.

Like other popular comedies, the story of the play is not much attractive one: the story of miser Haider Ali brings out some hidden negative tendencies of the elite people in a comic way. To make the play enjoyable, Tariq Anam has used the typical Dhakaia dialect (a mixture of Bangla and Urdu). He has also used slangs. With the aid such comical language, he has punched satire of some contemporary socio-political issues.

A director has to maintain certain pace and techniques for this type of European comedies. Liaquat Ali Lucky as the director of the play could efficiently maintain the technique, although it lacked the required pace at the end of the play.

Lucky's set design is suggestive: the exterior design of the house of Haider is appropriate for the theme of play. Light design is simple with the use of two follow-lights or general light most of the time.

Yasmin Ali's using of popular Urdu songs as the background music of the play is enjoyable.

Swadesh Ranjan as Haidar Ali, Kamrun Nur Chowdhury as Lal Mia, Sajedul Alam Dalim as Kala Mia and Zinat Jahan Anita as Golapjan performed well. However, the rest of the cast could not maintain the same standard.

BGTF will arrange three more festivals---Aktaruzzaman
Aktaruzzaman, Programme Secretary of BGTF, is the chief of Samay Shankskritik Goshthi. He is also the Member Secretary of the convening committee of Dhaka Drama Festival 2004.

Aktar said, 'We invited all theatrical groups of Dhaka to stage their best productions in the festival. The groups showed good response to the federation, although they did not submit all the required materials in time. As a result we are facing some problems.

'Communication is a problem for the Experimental Theatre Stage as the venue for drama. But I think its facilities will attract the groups to come here frequently and then, I believe, the communication will be easier as long as it becomes a popular venue,' Aktar added.

Aktar informed that in August BGTF will arrnge another festival at Chunkha at Naranganj featuring some selected theatrical groups of Dhaka division. 'After that we will arrange two more festivals in Sylhet and Chittagong introducing local groups.'

Ershad Kamol