My fascination with theatre began in 2020 when I first watched ‘Hamilton’ on my notebook computer at some stage in lockdown. I was awed by how actors carried the form of prolonged manufacturing with ease and consistency.
In disagreement to feature motion photos, the set scenes may perchance well also be perfected over a entire lot of takes, theatre demands perseverance and precision each time the curtain rises.
Nevertheless, it wasn’t till currently that I had the different to scrutinize a live play. My first ride used to be ‘Marx in Soho’, and I may perchance well perchance most definitely no longer personal asked for a greater introduction.
The hour-prolonged play, held at Bangladesh Mohila Samity, by three separate dates from 28 to 30 November, had me captivated at some stage in its runtime. The play used to be done in Bangla by the neatly-known theatre troupe, BotTala.
Howard Zinn’s ‘Marx in Soho’ (1999) used to be at the birth written to be a one man play. In an enticing twist, Umme Habiba joins Humayun Azam Rewaz as a calm addition to the efficiency.
Despite years passing since its fashioned publication, the play manages to stay related. Within the play, Marx returns from the grave to critique the present system, particular person that remains as unsuitable and oppressive because it used to be at some stage in his lifetime.
By stories of his non-public lifestyles, at the side of his relationship with his notable other Jenny and their exile from metropolis to metropolis, Marx reiterates a key message—his work, ‘Das Kapital’, used to be now no longer meant to incite violence or intellectual elitism but to signify for equality.
Classic human needs such as meals, tablets, safe haven and clothing—may perchance well perchance most definitely additionally aloof never rely on one’s social class, he argues. But, even after 157 years, the complications he addressed persist.
The actors had been in a region to flawlessly raise this play to lifestyles on the stage. Despite about a audience individuals disrupting the ride by snapping photos (sarcastically at some stage in a play about Karl Marx), the efficiency used to be a triumph.
One in every of essentially the most placing lines of the evening used to be: “I am Karl Marx, but I am now no longer a Marxist.” These words, delivered with a commanding say by Rewaz, will pause with me for a actually prolonged time.
Rewaz portrayed Marx with undeniable presence, whereas Habiba, his co-performer, left an equally considerable affect by her expressive choreography.
Despite the indisputable reality that Habiba’s personality had no dialogue, her movements spoke volumes, constructing a excellent steadiness with Rewaz’s eloquent monologues. Their onstage chemistry used to be electric, grounding the play in emotional depth.
With that being said, obvious capabilities of the efficiency felt rushed. Some non-public anecdotes about Marx’s lifestyles had been left incomplete, leaving the myth momentarily disjointed.
These minor flaws, nonetheless, did cramped to detract from the elevated message of the manufacturing.
By the level the final highlight former, the play had delivered a convincing search files from—why, after all this time, pause we aloof want Marx to remind us of the same systemic failures?
Leaving the dimmed theatre, I may perchance well perchance most definitely no longer shake the idea that Marx’s observation used to be painfully apt— as years hump, some things stay unchanged.
