3rd Natrang Theatre Festival of 2018 concluded here today ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ - AAJ KI SATTA

3rd Natrang Theatre Festival of  2018 concluded here today with the superb presentation of Shakespeare’s globally acclaimed play ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ under the direction of Aarushi Thakur Rana who also adapted and designed this magnificent performance. Currently settled in England, Aarushi Thakur Rana after graduating from St Stephens, New Delhi did her Masters from University of Leister, UK and also specialised in dramatics from Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, London.   Earlier welcoming the jam-packed audience, Natrang director Balwant Thakur dwelt in detail about the journey of Natrang’s 35 eventful years. To mark these celebrations Natrang is organising a festival of four plays every month since May, 2018 and so far 12 major plays of Natrang have been featured in these festivals. Natrang has set a target of showcasing 48 major plays by its own team of directors, designers and actors.

 Today’s play ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ is William Shakespeare's most popular comedy, set in an enchanted forest with fairies, sparring lovers and a group of comical actors who are putting on a play. It is a story of order and disorder, reality and appearance and love and marriage.

The play consists of three interconnecting plots, in the first plot Egeus, a military advisor wants his rebellious daughter Hermia to marry Demetrius but Hermia refuses, because she's in love with Lysander. He orders Hermia to obey her father or, according to regional law, she must face a death penalty.

Hermia and Lysander decide to elope that night. They confide in their friend Helena who is secretly in love with Demetrius so, hoping to win his affection, she tells him of Hermia's plan. That night, all four lovers set out into the forest.

Meanwhile, a group of armature actors led by Peter Quince and Bottom are planning to perform a play on the celebration of Hermia’s wedding. In the third plot, Titania and Oberon, the king and queen of the forest are having a quarrel over a precious jewel. To take revenge on Titania, Oberon puts a magical spell on her which would make her fall in love with the first thing she sees as soon as she wakes. She wakes up and falls in love with Bottom, the actor who is rehearsing in the forest. The same spell is wrongfully used by Puck, the assistant of Oberon on the four lovers in the forest. This all leads to a comical twist in the story where the two lovers fall in love with the wrong girl Helena.

The artists who participated in the play included  Mahikshit Singh, Gautam Kumar, Gopi Sharma, Sanket Bhagat, Sonalika Jamwal, Goutam Sharma, Gauri Thakur, Vrinda Sharma, Mohit Koul, Manoj Kumar Lalotra, Vrinda Gujral, Saanvi Anand, Vanshika Gupta, Agam Kaur, Kyannat Gupta, Sushant Singh Charak, Mihir Gujral, Bhisham Gupta, Rahul Gupta, Imtiyaz Shah, Afaque Khan and  Ajay Kumar Lalotra. The lights of the play were designed and executed by Shivam Singh who also looked after the sets and properties of the play whereas the sound was rendered by by Brijesh Avtaar Sharma. The show was coordinated by Abhi Bargotra and the presentations were done by Sunita Pandit