A Night Out (with the girls) At the Theatre

Today was one busy day. Immediately after the Amnet events we rushed home to shower off a day of sweat of griminess and fresh’n up for a night at Sparky’s for Miles and a girl’s night out for me. I met my friend Ann there and then had Rama drive us to pick up a couple more friends and the 4 of us went out to see the musical Cinderella. It is so nice to get out and do things like that as there really is not a whole lot to DO in Chennai as in other big cities. The “arts” are not very prevalent in Southern India. There is a very nice theatre called the Museum Theatre available for small organized theatre groups…but they are very few and far between. Well, there was a group that got together for the plays Beauty and the Beast and Cinderella and finding out about it was quite exciting. We missed the opportunity to see Beauty and the Beast as they were only showing one weekend and we were busy, but we jumped at Cinderella.

(Karen, Ann, Me, and Elizabeth)

We arrived at the theatre to find that there was no power. Pretty typical of India. They were running on generators to provide power only for the stage lights and sound. That left no power for lights to find your seats or air conditioning. Did I mention how hot today was? SUPER HOT! The four of us were roasting! It was incredibly hot but we felt worse for the actors on stage under the heat of the stage lights on top of the heat already in the theatre. Crazy!

I so wish I could share pictures of the play and sets and all to show you what a play in India looks like, however the lighting (or lack thereof) made this too difficult.

The play itself was not that great. It was the modern day version of the play Cinderella. The band was live, and it was the best part. I was not sure exactly what to expect. The acting was terrible, and the musical numbers were American pop songs straight off of the season 1 soundtrack of Glee. I am not kidding. All of them somehow incorporated throughout the script and in very awkward places that did not quite fit the scene….At ALL! I giggled quite loudly as Cinderella got yelled at by her stepmother in a mall (opening scene) and she breaks out in Defying Gravity from Wicked. No joke. And if I hear one bar or anything close to the song “Don’t Stop Believing”…I think I might go crazy. I think we stopped counting after 10 times of that song being played. They played it in the beginning three times, before the play started during technical difficulties, during all the scene changes, and of course in the play once with the entire cast, and also at the end of the play as well as after the play while we were walking out.

The power did go out a few times on the poor actors who just continued their songs/lines until the power came back on. I am telling you it was a very different sort of experience than what one would expect when going to a musical. As much as I have many a high school play in comparison look like Broadway, and I am sounding very critical of the Cinderella production, I am so very glad they did it! Theatre needs to be supported and encouraged here at all cost. Most have never heard of these stories, or seen a play or any sort of live acting whatsoever. The arts can shape a community and give people hope as it widens horizons and brings in education and perspective….learning there is so much out there than the hardships of everyday life the people face here. The average local here is up early working…all day, rain or shine, fighting disease, poverty, hunger…and never get to see there is more out there than that. While the art community is small and plays are few and far between (and as “terrible” as they might be) they are WONDERFUL and such a good thing to support. I am hoping to see many plays while we are here and maybe bring some local people (like our driver Rama) along with us who don’t even know English that well so that they too can experience the wonder and magic that you only get from the theatre.

-Jenny