Andhrula Haasya Rasaswadanam: Events in Hyderabad

REVIEW FOR ANDHRULA HAASYA RASASWADANAM

Well, we've got news, what say? The festival is gradually gathering momentum,
with more people visiting the venue, Necklace Road, compared to the inaugural
and initial evenings. And a series of lively performances ensued today to delight
the audiences!

After the treat of visual humor at the recent cartoon festival at Lumbini Park, yet another satire comes, this time as part of this festival of Andhra, with action and dialogue, to leave the audiences in guffaws! Titled Andhrula Haasya Rasawadanam, this plethora of bits and pieces of plays and jokes enacted by the most popular cine comedians came as a pleasant surprise for the audience.

Headed by Jandhyala and 'Iron Leg' Sastry, most of the tiny narratives evolved around funny situations between wives and husbands, with each taking shots at the other. This was like all those popular joke series of cinemas on live. And these are the pieces that break the monotony of any cinema or even sustain the interest of a rather boring story all through humor itself.

This one-hour humorous drama was followed by a much-embellished and decorated dance composition by
the veteran Kumkum Mohanty and a group of young dancers from the Odissi Research Centre at Bhubaneswar. Kumkum believes in presenting pure designed dance embellished with symmetric formations when it is to be on stage for a mass audience in large open theaters like this venue. And so was her choreography, which saw over ten dancers dressed in coordinated colors and moving and spreading across the stage through a visually pleasing attitude.

Looking like those dancing dolls, the dancers including Kumkum Mohonthy commenced with a 'Mangala Charan' attributed to Lord Rama, which saw the whole of the Ramayana in a nutshell narrative choreography.

The following 'Battu' and 'Pallavi' were pure dance numbers that saw sculpturesque stances of the Mithuna couples of the Konark temple, and also compositions that, in an abstract manner, traced the form of the temple space. The production also included two expressional dances that the group performed with dramatized sequences like the Jayadeva Astapadis 'Sita Kamal Kucha Mandala' and another 'Chandana Charchita'.

Vocalists Sangita Gosain and Lata Ghosh headed orchestral support. It is interesting to note that Kumkum has also used her group's choreography to depict issues like the Kargil war (recently staged at Kargil), cyclones and films like Mother India.