BHOPAL: Based on the classic French comedy ‘The Miser’ (L’Avare), written by Molière, an Urdu play ‘Kanjoos’ was staged on Monday- the fourth day of the five-day Urdu drama festival at Ravindra Bhawan. Dealing with different dimensions of selfishness pervading the society, the farce was directed by Sarfaraz Hasan and translated into Urdu by Hazrat Aawara.
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage-name Molière, was a French playwright and actor, considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature. Among Molière’s best-known works are The Misanthrope, The School for Wives, Tartuffe, The Miser, The Imaginary Invalid and The Bourgeois Gentleman.
‘The Miser’ was first performed on September 9, 1668, in the theatre of the Palais-Royal in Paris. It was produced when Molière’s company was under the protection of the French Emperor Louis XIV himself.
The hilarious play revolves around a Muslim family of Bhopal. The main character Mirza is very miserly. Not only his children but his servants, friends and neighbours too became victims of his miserliness, introducing rib-tickling laughter in the play. The first preys of his miserliness are his children: Farukh and Ajra. The play takes an interesting turn when Mirza and his son Farukh want to get married with the same girl Mariam. On the other hand, Nasir, the lover of Ajra works as servant in Mirza’s home out of love for his sweetheart. Meanwhile, 10,000 asharfis of the miser Mirza are stolen, which he had hidden in the courtyard of his home. He doubts everyone and makes a plan with a Hawaldar to catch the thief. The play ends with many interesting scenes in which Nasir is identified as the lost son of Nawab
The one-hour-and-twenty-minutes-long play, wonderfully presented by young actors of city-based Young theatre group in Bhopali diction, entertained the theatre buffs a lot. Lights were designed by Brijesh Anay and make up by Narendra Singh Rajput.
Talking to Free Press, director, Hasan said, “I wanted to work on Molière’s play four years back with senior theatre artists. But later, I dropped this idea and decided to do this play with young actors so that they could learn the techniques of comedy. Comedy is a very tough genre”.
“What is interesting about the play is that young persons have essayed the roles of old characters,” he added.
