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Love, Money, Murder, Magic!EDDS gets close and confidential with Shakespeare

Munasir Kamal

The Edds (English Department Drama Society) Inter Batch Performance Competition, held on Saturday 18 August 2007 at Natmondol in Dhaka University, kicked off with the pot-bellied Shylock jingling his bags of gold while swaying to the tunes of ABBA's “Money, money, money.” This was indeed an unusual way to begin a competition on Shakespeare's plays. Extracts from four plays were staged in the course of the evening, and the performances were judged by the teachers of the Department of English of Dhaka University. The program was undertaken to teach the students decision-making, team-work and organization. Therefore the music, set and light design of the productions were mainly determined by their respective directors, with guidance from Ms. Tahmina Ahmed associate professor of the English Department of Dhaka University and teacher-in-charge of EDDS.

The first performance was from the opening act of The Merchant of Venice, which in Shakespeare's original play is set in an open space in the city. However, the director Sabreena Ahmed chose to portray the scene in Shylock's office, with the latter sitting at a desk counting his coins. At this point Bassanio barges in with a proposition that Shylock lend Antonio three-thousand ducats for three months. His entrance is followed by that of Antonio himself, who quarrels with Shylock. We learn that Antonio had called the money-lender a cur and spat on him in public due to his Jewish identity and are reminded of the consequences of religious intolerance. Antonio is more than confident that he will be able to repay the loan on time, and hence agrees to sign the ominous treaty. Suhas Shankar Chowdhury, the actor of Shylock, did an excellent job in bringing out the shrewdness of Shylock's character, who in this scene pretends that the pound-of-flesh condition is no more than a jest. The scene ends appropriately with the sound of winds at sea as Antonio speaks a warning to the audience of events to come.

The second extract to be staged was one of the opening scenes of As You Like It, directed by Rajib Bhowmick. It opened with Rosalind grieving her father's banishment, and her cousin Celia trying to cheer her up. Soon the hero Orlando enters the stage, and Rosalind and Orlando immediately fall in love in the approved Shakespearean fashion. Pronabesh Bhowmik was brilliant at acting the part of the lovesick lad. The scene also included an exciting wrestling match between Orlando and Charles. Samiur Rahman Mahid who played the part of Charles won the applause of the audience, despite being an evil character in the play, for comically showing off his muscles on stage. The scene ended with Rosalind and Orlando being separated, with Richard Marx's Right Here Waiting playing in the background. Tasin Ashraf, a student of the same 3rd year batch, played an important role in supplying the music for this scene from Shakespeare.

The next performance was from the end of Othello, in which the lighting effects were very marked. Soft blue lights were used to create the intimate effect of a bedroom; blended with that were red lights spelling danger. The lights complimented the costumes well as Sudipta Roy, acting as Othello, appeared clad in a red gown proclaiming his intentions to kill his wife for having an affair. The naive-looking Desdemona, played by Sayeda Nur-e-Royhan, enters the scene and is unable to convince Othello of her innocence. She is strangled but later cleared by Emilia, wife of Iago the culprit of the story. Emilia is then killed by her husband, who manages to escape. Othello, horrified by what he has done, kills himself. This combined team was directed by Rubaid Iftekhar Mahbub.

The final performance of the competition was particularly interesting since director Fatima Tuz Zahra chose to merge the two scenes in which the witches appear before Macbeth. This team consisted of all final year honors students. The witches on stage were not the old and ugly hags that Shakespeare depicts but three vivacious young women Sabrina Nawshin, Sharmin Ara Rimu, and Tasnuva Tarannum. They danced and chanted around a cauldron, in which a dhup was used to create a smoky effect. During the first round of prophesies Macbeth, acted by Waheed Sadique, is told that he shall be king. Following that was the scene of Macbeth hallucinating a dagger before him. This spectacle was successfully shown with the help of a knife suspended from a cord. The dagger eludes Macbeth for a while, but he is finally able to grasp it in his hands and the illusion becomes a reality. During the second round of prophesies, the witches convince Macbeth that he is invincible, which is soon proved wrong in the combat with the masked Macduff.

While the scores were being counted, two teachers from the English Department Prof. Kaiser Haq and Ms. Rumana Siddique kindly agreed to entertain the audience with a reading from The Taming of the Shrew. Though Prof. Kaiser Haq announced upon stepping on stage “no rehearsals, no costumes,” their performance seemed very well-rehearsed, and to compensate for the lack of costumes, Ms. Rumana Siddique alias Katherine supplied her own prop a fan to hit Petruchio with!

After the teachers' performance, Prof. Syed Manzoorul Islam and Prof. Fakrul Alam distributed tokens of acknowledgement to all the participants in the competition, followed by the announcement of the results by Prof. Khondakar Ashraf Hossain Chairman of the Department of English, Dhaka University. Despite a tight contest, the winner was the fourth year students who performed Macbeth. Their achievement was due to the outstanding acting by the three witches and some remarkable directing work. All in all, being a spectator at the EDDS Inter Batch Performance Competition was a very enjoyable experience.