This upcoming production, ‘Gretel,’ reimagines a timeless tale through sound and movements

I grew up hearing the tale of Hansel and Gretel and have known Gretel’s character since childhood. The story always intrigued me — it begins with leaving home or being cast out and turns into an unexpected adventure when the siblings meet a witch in the forest. Revisiting it with Rebecca Spurgeon, gave me a new perspective on Gretel — one that I’ve held close ever since. I found it fascinating how leaving home opens up a world of unknowns — about yourself and your surroundings. And when you wish to return, home no longer feels the same, because both you and it have changed. We are always searching for that sense of home, of familiarity and comfort, yet it keeps shifting every time we do.

The play was created through devising. At its core, Hansel and Gretel is a simple story — two children are cast out by their parents, wander through a forest, find a house made of food, start eating it and are caught by a witch. Rebecca broke this familiar tale into parts and opened it up in our rehearsal room. We discussed each scene, explored the emotions and motives behind it and then began devising on the floor — without words, through movement. The script, in that sense, is minimal, almost wordless. Whatever few lines exist emerged naturally from this process. There’s a lot of us in it — not just the story, but our own experiences. That’s where the play’s language comes from; it’s purely physical and rooted in mime. For the music, Rebecca worked separately with the musicians. After writing the lyrics, she collaborated with Anant Menon and Vedant Bharadwaj to create the soundscape from scratch, later weaving together the music and movement into a seamless whole.

If you watch the play, you wouldn’t be able to pinpoint where one scene ends and another begins — it all moves fluidly from moment to moment. What makes it truly challenging is the responsibility of carrying the story within us so strongly that it flows seamlessly without words. Much of it is abstract; it isn’t a straightforward, tell-tale narrative. Nothing is spoon-fed — both the performers and the audience must rely on imagination. The play remains open to interpretation and our task is to ensure that this flow of meaning stays clear, that there’s no confusion in the storytelling. With a non-verbal, minimal performance and just two bodies on stage, we have to make sure every movement is precise. That, perhaps, is the hardest part and also the most exciting.

Going back to how the play was made — when you think about it, we all grapple with similar questions: feeling lost, searching for identity, understanding how we exist in relation to others, to family, to our circles. These are universal questions we ask ourselves, both personally and spiritually. From the very beginning, we spoke about them at length, finding our own connections to these themes and using those cues to start devising. We brought our memories and stories into the process, so everything in the play carries a piece of us. It all comes from a deeply personal space.

Personally, it would be to not look at things so strictly or take yourself so seriously. Even though we’re talking about grave things, sometimes we can be light about them. I feel that after COVID-19, everyone’s been taking themselves a little too seriously, questioning everything. Life’s unpredictable — you’ll never fully figure it out. I think life’s whole purpose is just to discover yourself, again and again. It’s okay to be in constant search. This production made me think about all this.