Today what I am going to share can rarely be
seen now-a-days…
“Jatra”…do you know what it is, I know you all
are acquainted with this but with different names…like Nautanki in Uttar
Pradesh, Tamasha in Maharashtra and Bhavai in Gujrat, though there are slight
differences with all these with the so called Bengali Jatra.
In Bengali “Jatra’ means the journey, literally
it means…when you are moving from one place to another then it’s called Jatra,
with the same thought the Bengali folk theaters are called Jatra because when
television and mobile were beyond the imagination of human being those days
Jatra used to play an important role for the entertainment and the journey used
to start from the month of September and used to end before the beginning of
monsoon, the troops used to visit different places…villages and towns and used
to perform the jatra.
Origin
The most interesting fact about the origin of
Jatra is…it was traditionally created during lord Chaitanya’s Bhakti movement, where
Chaitnya Dev used the play the role of Rukmini(the wife of Lord Krishna).
Though Jatra originated with different
religious movements but later it has left a deep impact and performed to spread
social, ethical and moral awareness, it always contains some good messages for
the society.
Jatra usually performed openly in a stage made
with bamboos and curtains and with musical concert. Generally Jatra Pala use to
start from night and ends in the midnight or dawn.
With time lots of changes has happened with the
stage and with the content.
Earlier days Jatra used to be performed only by
the male members, they used to play both the male characters and the female
characters with proper get ups.
When we talk about theater and don’t mention
Binodini Dasi…that will be not fair.
Binodini Dasi widely popular as Noti
Binodini…she started her carrier under the guidance of famous theater director GirishChandra Ghosh, who was also a poet, novelist, actor, play writer and musician.
Noti Binodini performed more than in eighty
roles in her twelve years of carrier, she had mastery in acting, there is a
real incident that explains her hold in acting that took place in famous Star
Theater in Kolkata…she was playing the role of Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and in
the audience there was Ramkrishna Paramhansa Dev…she performed the role so
fantastically that seeing her acting Ramkrsihna went into trans.
Noti Binodini is the perfect example which
explains that acting can take you to how much height…she came into theater from
brothel house yet by acting she achieved everyone’s’ respect, later not only
did she study but also wrote few books.
The difference between theater and Drama is…
You have to deliver dialogue almost four times
higher voice than drama and the acting should be too much expressive.
It is said that….it’s much easier to act in
movies than to act in Jatra….because there is no chance of re-take, you have to
perform in one chance, this is the reason thespian actors are more welcome in
cinema world.
There is also a common thought that…the Jatra
of Bengal is good to listen and the Jatra of Odissa is good to watch…it does
not mean at all that the actors of Odissa are not good or the stages in West
benagl are not well designed…actually it is said because the Jatra Pala in West
Bengal is performed in a single stage where as the Jatra Pala in Odissa is
performed in different stages.
Here are some notable Bengali theater actor
Ritwik Ghatak...an well know Film Director also.
Utpal Dutta...an well known film actor.
Soumitra Chatterjee...Bengali actor, Dad Saheb Phalke award winner.
here i am sharing two video so that you can relate more deeply with Bengali Jatra...
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