Curtain Call to stage Sharmila Maitra's adaptation of The Canterville Ghost
Curtain Call to stage Sharmila Maitra's adaptation of The Canterville Ghost

Curtain Call's new production Bhunibabu'r Chandni is an adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s The Canterville Ghost

Goutam Halder will be playing the lead role in Tirthankar Chattopadhyay’s production

AS THE MONSOON sets in, how about a bhooter golpo served with real-life ambience and music? If the idea sounds too good to be true, then wait for the first Monday of July, and see your dreams (rather fears) come true, as the ghost of Bhuni Babu awaits your arrival, to serenade you with his haunting thumris and ghazals, at the ancient mansion known as Bhunibabu’r Chandni.

Before your anticipation turns to curiosity, let us reveal that it is Goutam Halder, one of the most enigmatic theatre artistes of the city, who will play Bhuni Babu in Tirthankar Chattopadhyay’s latest production, Bhunibabu’r Chandni, based on Sharmila Maitra’s Bengali adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s The Canterville Ghost.

<em>Goutam Halder as Bhuni Babu</em>
Goutam Halder as Bhuni Babu

“Sharmila Maitra’s adaptation is quite similar to Wilde’s text, and has been Indian-ised to suit our socio-cultural context,” informs Chattopadhyay, who’s the director and founder of the theatre group Curtain Call, which will celebrate its seventh anniversary on July 1.

Chattopadhyay further reveals, “I chose to do this play as I found the bleakness of the society these days to be quite suffocating. There is neither hope nor a solution to the prevalent atrocities in the world. It made me realise that we needed to tell a story, which serves up as a timely lesson for all of us — a play that has the right amount of humour and solemness.”

<em>Tirthankar Chattopadhyay</em>
Tirthankar Chattopadhyay

Bhuni Babu is a mighty artiste and singer of yore, who is short-tempered and cruel, but a fine connoisseur of food, women, and music. But soon he also finds himself as a murderer. Locked up in a room of his own mansion for his misdeeds, he lies undead and awake, not to forget, hungry for more than a century, and waits for his redemption.

He scares away anybody who pays a visit to his bungalow. One day, he realises that none of his tricks work on the family members of a block development officer (played by Ashim Raychowdhury) who recently moved into his mansion. Instead, he is heckled, harassed and laughed upon.

<em> A still from Bhunibabu’r Chandni</em>
 A still from Bhunibabu’r Chandni

Anuprerona (played by Rajyosri Malakar), the teenage daughter of the officer, is the only one who is empathetic towards him, and redeems the souls of Bhuni Babu and his makeup man. Her personal account in a diary, which bears witness to Bhuni Babu’s tale, is found by Sudhanya (played by Bratin Gangopadhyay) — 20 years later.

“Initially, I was thinking of doing plays which were darker in mood, but as I started dwelling on the themes of Wilde’s text, I realised that it’s only love that transcends, forgives and redeems this life, and we need to relearn this dictum today,” he affirms. The sets and lights have been designed by Arun Mondal and Soumen Chakraborty respectively, and the sound operation has been taken care of by Kalyan Sarkar, while Saswata Chattopadhyay has arranged the scenography.

At the Academy of Fine Arts on July 1, 6.30 pm.

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