A day after staging her autobiographical play Drama Queen , the multi-faceted Suchitra Krishnamoorthi was in a hour-long conversation ‘Celebrating Theatre’ with Mohammed Ali Baig and the packed crowd at British Council, as she mocked, analysed and looked back at her life with a pinch of salt. Taking time out to read excerpts from her book, she fielded questions on her interest to return to films, art besides several incidents that helped her shape Drama Queen . Excerpts from a conversation.
Her life as a play
“It was a tough choice to decide the episodes of the book that could make it to the play. The difficult part was staging them. We were considering several actors who could play the parts on stage besides an option of playing their videos whenever a conversation ensued, while I staged my part live.”
Defining success
“Why do we always like to go by the popular and societal notion of success and career fulfilment? Marriage could be a goal for some. Why compare and don’t let the moment be?”
Where caste mattered
“When I first staged Drama Queen in Lucknow, I had this experience of ladkiyan apni aukaat mein rahen . People found it awkward to find a woman discussing such intimate details about herself. There was a line about caste and I remember two people walking out of the auditorium. The organiser pointed out to me that ‘caste is a big thing here’. I just asked why should it be?”
On languages
“I think the only language I know well is English. My Hindi is atrocious, my Telugu is bad and so is Tamil. The last Telugu movie I watched was the dubbed version of OK Kanmani .”
Art is a gift
“I took up painting when I was on a personal low. It was the tenth day of Ganesh Chaturthi and I had just immersed my idol. An artist friend of mine, realising I wasn’t doing well emotionally, offered me something to eat. But what happened later was magical, the strokes just started flowing, I finished about 76 art works in a span of two weeks. More than anything else, I feel it’s a gift in the last few years, one reason I give names surrounding spirituality to my exhibitions.”
Films are easy
“In films, there are so many opportunities to do better, so many attempts in taking a sequence and approaching it afresh a day later. Films are easy. In theatre it’s the moment that matters. If you don’t grab it on time, it’s gone. I was so conscious of staging Drama Queen that I wanted a prompter on stage despite knowing my lines. The nervousness of ‘what if I don’t remember the line’ subsided soon. I just had to feel everything was okay, that I would render it well.”
