On 20th September at GD Birla Sabhagar watch ভানু by Suman Mukhopadhyay, acted by Debshankar Haldar, Biswajit Chakraborty, Suman Mukhopadhyay, Bidipta Chakraborty, Ashim Roychowdhury, Anandarupa Chakraborty & others. Time : 6:30 P.M. Bhanu is based on Anton Chekov's 'Uncle Vanya'.
It's a classic work of dramatic literature, known for its exploration of themes like unfulfilled dreams, disillusionment, and the human condition.
Director’s Note : Suman Mukhopadhyay :
When Ujjwal Chattopadhyay and I set out to create a new Bengali translation of Uncle Vanya, our hope was to remain deeply faithful to Chekhov’s original while shaping a language that felt immediate, alive, and unmistakably rooted in Bengali sensibility. I envisioned a contemporary staging that wouldn’t loudly announce its modernity, but would instead let the story feel quietly and organically grounded in the “here and now”—a world marked by economic uncertainty, climate anxiety, and our ongoing search for purpose, love, and the meaning of labor.
To realize this vision, I approached the play not as a radical reimagining, but as a quiet adaptation. What happens when a Russian masterpiece about disillusionment and yearning is filtered through the particular crises of our own time? What does it mean to hear these characters speak in a voice that feels familiar? To watch them confront not the twilight of czarist Russia, but the harsh glare of India’s growing capitalism and deepening inequality—where despair and spiritual fatigue have become part of our daily fabric?
My aim was to dissolve the distance between then and now, between Chekhov’s world and our own. I remain profoundly grateful to Anton Chekhov—who understood, perhaps better than anyone, that the longing to be useful, to be loved, to wrest meaning from the brief span of our lives, is universal. Through his stories and his plays, he reminds us again and again that “life is given to us only once.”
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