Emergency generator at Mahila Samity auditorium
Tuesday, 10 March 2009
THAT the Mahila Samity auditorium has played a great role in the advancement of our theatre there is little doubt. Right after independence there were hardly any stage facilities in the Dhaka. And here it was, the Mahila Samity Mancha as it is popularly known, in a very accessible place in the city, absolutely perfect for the growing number of theatre groups in the capital-which in itself was a most extraordinary development in the annals of our culture.
That was a long time ago. However, the auditorium has changed little. True, it is now fully air-conditioned and the chairs are different (more durable), the stage lighting has been modernised and there are a few cosmetic changes here and there. But for the amount of revenue it collects from different parties, many of them being theatre groups who still regularly hold their shows in this auditorium, one would expect the Mahila Samity authority to have an emergency generator. Is it too much to ask?
The other day, I was watching Nagorik Natya Sampradaya stage Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida, a most gripping play and the most different and difficult among Shakespeare's plays when the electricity went off. This was the last ten minutes of the play as it turned out but we had to wait for more than twenty minutes while the Nagorik theatre workers lit up a line of candles for the play to finish.
I would thus request the hall authorities to kindly get an emergency generator. After all, load shedding is a regular phenomena, is it not?
Rawshan Ara
Bara Maghbazar, Dhaka
That was a long time ago. However, the auditorium has changed little. True, it is now fully air-conditioned and the chairs are different (more durable), the stage lighting has been modernised and there are a few cosmetic changes here and there. But for the amount of revenue it collects from different parties, many of them being theatre groups who still regularly hold their shows in this auditorium, one would expect the Mahila Samity authority to have an emergency generator. Is it too much to ask?
The other day, I was watching Nagorik Natya Sampradaya stage Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida, a most gripping play and the most different and difficult among Shakespeare's plays when the electricity went off. This was the last ten minutes of the play as it turned out but we had to wait for more than twenty minutes while the Nagorik theatre workers lit up a line of candles for the play to finish.
I would thus request the hall authorities to kindly get an emergency generator. After all, load shedding is a regular phenomena, is it not?
Rawshan Ara
Bara Maghbazar, Dhaka