Flash back: And thus danced memory
Dolly Thakore, theatre veteran
Theatre actor and host, Dolly Thakore, remembers her fondest memories with her closest friend and danseuse Protima Bedi.
My first impression of this stunningly attractive, dark Ajanta-like-figure, wrapped in a white saree, with fresh white mogras in her hair, heavily kohl-lined large eyes, seductively leaning against a column of St Xavier’s College Hall in Mumbai, where I was attending a rehearsal of Marat Sade dates back to January 1969.
It was on a hot summer afternoon, and a delayed-flight in Coimbatore, sitting on a muddy rock-heap outside the airport, that Protima confided her dream of establishing a dance village. And my tryst with Indian classical dance and music began. Till then, I had only heard of Bharatnatyam. I compered her first solo Odissi dance performance at a coffee shop at the then-newly-established Centaur Hotel, near Mumbai airport and her exquisitely performed Jatayu in Ram Charitra Manas had me hooked. More opportunities to perform poured in from Bangalore, Calcutta, and Delhi. And she insisted I compere those.
She once changed her first class train ticket for two air conditionedsleepers to accommodate me – this was before the advent of air travel. And those train journeys is where I learnt about abhinay and mudra, tandav and taal.
She accepted everything life had to offer. She gave of herself 100 per cent to people in her orbit. Her single-minded agenda made her shun all the luxuries and security. She slept on platforms, and smelly waiting rooms; defecated in the open; dodged snakes and scorpions of Hasseraghatta; adapted to the frugal diet of villagers.
Thus, was laid the foundation of Nrityagram and she became “Gaurima”. On August 18, we celebrated 25 years of that dream. Incidentally, this image is from Nrityagram in 1997 or early 98 just before she died. I have reprinted it on the curtain in in January 2013.
While a roaring landslide and torrential rain grabbed her away from us seventeen years ago, her dance village stands rock still and enjoys the reputation of having produced the finest dancers in the world Sarupu Sen and Bijayini Satpathy. And she is alive in every leaf, every dragonfly, and every grain of soil that is Nrityagram.
Theatre actor and host, Dolly Thakore, remembers her fondest memories with her closest friend and danseuse Protima Bedi.
My first impression of this stunningly attractive, dark Ajanta-like-figure, wrapped in a white saree, with fresh white mogras in her hair, heavily kohl-lined large eyes, seductively leaning against a column of St Xavier’s College Hall in Mumbai, where I was attending a rehearsal of Marat Sade dates back to January 1969.
Her reputation, as the founder of the first discotheque – HIDEOUT – in the then happy, carefree Bombay, her defying-bold live-in relationship with a Greek God (whom she later married) and her modelling shows, were my first introduction to this free spirit, as we shared train coupes and hotel rooms from Amritsar to Trivandrum.
It was on a hot summer afternoon, and a delayed-flight in Coimbatore, sitting on a muddy rock-heap outside the airport, that Protima confided her dream of establishing a dance village. And my tryst with Indian classical dance and music began. Till then, I had only heard of Bharatnatyam. I compered her first solo Odissi dance performance at a coffee shop at the then-newly-established Centaur Hotel, near Mumbai airport and her exquisitely performed Jatayu in Ram Charitra Manas had me hooked. More opportunities to perform poured in from Bangalore, Calcutta, and Delhi. And she insisted I compere those.
She once changed her first class train ticket for two air conditionedsleepers to accommodate me – this was before the advent of air travel. And those train journeys is where I learnt about abhinay and mudra, tandav and taal.
She accepted everything life had to offer. She gave of herself 100 per cent to people in her orbit. Her single-minded agenda made her shun all the luxuries and security. She slept on platforms, and smelly waiting rooms; defecated in the open; dodged snakes and scorpions of Hasseraghatta; adapted to the frugal diet of villagers.
Thus, was laid the foundation of Nrityagram and she became “Gaurima”. On August 18, we celebrated 25 years of that dream. Incidentally, this image is from Nrityagram in 1997 or early 98 just before she died. I have reprinted it on the curtain in in January 2013.
While a roaring landslide and torrential rain grabbed her away from us seventeen years ago, her dance village stands rock still and enjoys the reputation of having produced the finest dancers in the world Sarupu Sen and Bijayini Satpathy. And she is alive in every leaf, every dragonfly, and every grain of soil that is Nrityagram.
