Nine years ago, Basheer John moved to Hyderabad from Khammam. His love for theatre brought him to the city of Nawabs where he went on to pursue an MA in theatre.
Today, after a Nandi Award and several award-winning shows across the world, Basheer is adding yet another feather to his hat by showcasing a play in South Korea’s International Theatre Exchange Workshop and Festival. The play will also be presented at the prestigious PUM Theatre Festival.
The excitement is pretty evident in the voice of John, who is just back from Sweden after a talk at the Stockholm University and will shortly be heading to South Korea. “My work with an NGO for kids, Bhumika, got me this chance to perform in South Korea. I will be representing India,” he explains, adding, “We are deciding between a traditional play and one that deals with modern day India.”
For John, theatre has always been a way of life. “Back in Khammam, we would do a lot of street theatre. After moving to Hyderabad, I picked up other nuances of the artform,” he says. Always interested in writing and directing plays, John went on to direct a play for children that eventually won the Nandi Award in 2010. “The play Katta Katta Desham was about a foolish king which had a contemporary setting. We won the Nandi Award for best music and production,” he says.
However, it was after his Masters’ degree that he developed a keen interest to work with children. “We always talk about theatre disappearing. So to revive it, we need to start from the very beginning and that happens to be from the kids,” he says.
John primarily works in Telugu, Hindi and English. The director, whose play Katta Katta Desham has had 40 shows till date says, “I have done 17 plays, but then I thought why limit myself to a particular language, why not write something with no language at all.”
It was then that he wrote Whistle that has now completed 25 shows. “The actors speak gibberish and communicate in funny noises. The play is about how whistles control children at schools. We had our first show in 2014 and till date, my team has been travelling across the country with the show. The kids love it and the team is currently travelling to Kerala to take part in a competition,” he explains.
A pioneer in children’s theatre, John has worked with kids from impoverished backgrounds. One of his earliest plays was performed by kids from a slum in Kavadiguda. “Eventually, I moved from working with children to working for children,” he says. It was through this work that John got in touch with NGO Bhumika that put him through the theatre festival in South Korea.
