DARE - Because Entrepreneurs Do

Sanjna Kapoor is one of India’s leading theatre personalities. In her years at Prithvi Theatre, she has initiated a number of activities including children’s workshops. She is currently working towards an all-India theatre alliance, based on the practical sharing of resources and ideas

Theatre is not commercially viable in India. In what way can entrepreneurial spirit be injected into theatre?

There are different kinds of theatre in this country. You have folk theatre, traditional theatre, and commercial theatre. So you have a vast amount of theatre that is professional, that is financially viable, that people do. However, if we are talking about urban, so-called contemporary theatre or experimental theatre, it is where we fall into a great problem.

I think the basic need for that is definitely opportunities of performance, so you need to create those. As a producer, you need opportunities of performance, you need to have space where you can perform, and our government’s biggest problem is that they are not really looking at creating those spaces. Like, there is no scheme to fund or support Prithvi Theatre, they have no scheme to support an independent theatre space. Our government doesn’t seem to be looking at creating an audience.

In Germany or in various countries in the world, it is mandatory for schools to take their children to the theatre. Like they go to the fire station or the Coca-Cola factory or the ice- cream factory, they go to theatre. In Israel, it is mandatory for business houses to buy around 500 theatre tickets a year or 200 theatre tickets a year and they give them to their employees. This way you are building an audience; we have to basically understand that we have to build a theatre community and an audience.

You are passionate about circus. Is there a role for an entrepreneur for reviving it?
I am passionate about it, though I haven’t done enough work. There is a good community of circus producers. There are about 32 circus companies that have formed this group. Ironically, circus doesn’t fall within culture; it falls within sports, in Ministry of Sports.

You need to have training centers and also an exchange with circuses abroad, like those in France, Canada, Germany, and China. I am sure, there are circus schools, which are of the highest quality where you have incredible engagements and have the world’s leading dance choreographers working with acrobats, creating the most magical piece of theatre.

What I dream of is to have traveling circus in India, which goes from one place to another every five years. You would have a huge maidan which has five or ten tents and the performances would last throughout the day. We have circus performers who are treated lowest of the low in our strata of society. After the animals were taken out of circus, which I don’t think is a bad thing, their lot is even worse today. We need to give them prestige, we need to give them respect, and we need to say that your skills are tremendous.

Recently, I went to see a Russian circus, and it was fantastic. Then you have the Bombay Circus taking over, and clearly they have fantastic skills but lack the presentation ability. These things need to be taught, exchanged and promoted.

Do you think it would be commercially viable in the long run?
Absolutely. Look at our tradition, look at the circus performance on the streets! Unfortunately, the guys who do it are beggars at the signals and it is amazing what they do. If you are just able to pick them and say let’s give you space and let’s give you value, and allow you to use your art and your skills to get a better livelihood and to engage in society at a certain level.

Tell us something about the All India Theatre Alliance that you are working on. What is the purpose behind it?
Initially, the purpose was to explore the various themes and policies that have governed theatre or the theatre has provided in spite of. So it was to initiate to firstly educate ourselves to understand. As we know, we have so many different structures in our policy, we have center stage and then local and within those structures, within those systems what structures are in place and how theatre has survived. There is no way you can have one blanket system of policy making or thinking because its so different and varied.

I am ready to meet with and dialogue with theatre practitioners of the country. Its not an academic exercise. There are some components, which need to be academic just in terms of correcting data or generating information. A website will up very soon, hopefully we will avail various languages to access it. It has to be a living entity that the theatre community feeds and needs and Prithvi is dedicated to keeping it alive for three years and hopefully after that as well, but we would like it to take it off on its own.

There is a core group of six of us. Some of us continue to actually manage and run it and we have had four meetings so far. We have another one in March, in a place called Ninasam, which is one of the leading theatre institutions in the country. Prithvi Theatre is doing the most amazing work in taking and developing theatre in rural Karnataka. The creator of that space got the Magsaysay award, which he duly deserved. Unfortunately, he is no more, he passed away few years ago, but it is an inspirational place. It is a place I wish all business entrepreneurs go to.

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