Maut Ke Saaye Mai

December 20, 2005

Date : October 2002 & March 2003
Directors : Swati Agarwal & Anvita Mishra
Production Managers : -
Playwright : original by Jean Paul Satre
Form : Stage Play
Type : Oasis Entry

Cast :
Fransua - Mehul Jain
Kanauris - Shantanu Goel
Auri - Arvind Khilnani
Saurbiyar - Sandeep Gade
Joan - Swati Agarwal
Smith - Smitkant Raturi
Kloshe - Ashish Korde
Landriye - Ashwani Tikoo
Pilrey - Naresh Sharma
German sipahi - Shelly Agarwal / Kapil Sangawan / Ashish Bhargava

The Play :
Maut ke Saye Mein is a hindi adaptation of the critically acclaimed play "Morts sans sepulture" (Men without shadows) by french laureate Jean Paul Satre.

It is a play based in the dark ages of French Revolution when the very existence of human free will was under the strict vigilance of the Nazis. The story is about five prisoners of war who await their turn to be tested against the Nazis one by one. Inspite of its background, the play is entirely just about one thing - "human emotion under trying circumstances". Its about how these prisoners discover a new self of themselves so close to death. How each one of them proacts and reacts to the physical and emotional pain inflicted upon them. How some come close to the verge of breaking down .. how some realise the worthilessness of their lives .. how some see how close and yet so far can situations drive friends and lovers and how some get so taken by the idea of "winning" that they forgo all human reasons and relations. The high point of the story is the climax where the prisoners, who always wanted to die of honour, finally decide to live in shame .. live to see the beauty of the world .. to hope for the realization of freedom .. and it is just then when they were so full of "life" were they doomed to be killed !!!

During the second performance of the play, in March 2003, few actors were replaced.

Mehul Jain <--> Pratyush Singh
Ashwani Tikoo <--> Ashish Bhargava
Shelly Agarwal / Kapil Sangawan / Ashish Bhargava <--> Piyush Maskey / Mayuresh Soaji /Raheem Darediya

Some memories from the play -

When the play was being staged during oasis, as the scene of Auri killing fransua progressed, silence fell upon the audi .. which finally broke down with an applause by the judges !!!
Khillu almost never remembered his lines in the first few run-throughs .. he had to be provoked by cues like "Auri kya tum bhi joan se pyar karte ho" by Smit :)
Gade had to be slapped in one of the scenes by Kor, who had to use his left hand for it. There was a session by the guys dedicated just to show Kor how to slap with his left hand .. the target ... well poor gades right cheek :)
Due to some incidental accident, Kor was coined as "Korde Korde shyam rang korde" .. to upkeep the cleaniness of the site, the accident cannot be described :)
Talli ka famous "hmmmm" that carried on through the semester :)
Tallis extrememly real use of props where he could feed more noodles into his mouth with his mouth still shut and where a spoon could remodel as a pen in less than a minute .. should we say 007 tals !!