‘Raavto is appealing to youngsters as it also talks about live-in relationship’

Gujarati play directed by Rohit Prajapati, an MSU 2017 alumnus, was staged in Ahmedabad recently. The play has been adapted from William Shakespeare’s One of the challenges of is that the audience knows the story, says Rohit while talking to us after the play.

“Even if they don’t, a lot of them have watched Kareena Kapoor Khan, Saif Ali Khan and Ajay Devgn starrer that too has been based on this play.A lot of time people feel that the scenes in and are same as some of them haven’t read . The challenge that I faced was to convince them that it isn’t ’s scene but that of ,” he says sitting in the green room.
Rohit who plays antagonist Bakkar in the play began writing in 2016 and took a lot of inspiration for it from his own village in North Gujarat. “I am from Mehsana and the four male characters – Raavto, Digo, Bakkar and Chandu are actually real names of four youths in that village (laughs). Also, whenever we stage this play, show as someone in the cast keeps getting hurt.”
Lifting his Bakkar costume a bit, he shows us a small cut near his stomach, “Shows of this play are filled with blood. I got this wound today. I also got a sprain in one of my legs while performing on stage. Trishala (Chhipli in the play) also got an injury today. But, the show must go on.”
The other challenge, Rohit says, is language. “Most of our cast is from Vadodara where a lot of people prefer speaking in Gujarati. For 45 days, we rehearsed and tried to get that north Gujarati dialect where the play is based on. When it was an exam production, it was pure north Gujarati. There, sir saw it but when I took this play out, the challenge was to make people understand the language. Thus, I have used both Gujarati language as well as north Gujarati dialect.”
The play is also appealing to youngsters, he says, “I have also touched upon the subject of live-in relationship through the character of Sati (Female lead played by Sharvary Joshi). A lot of young couples in love flee in innocence and are ready to leave everything without realising the harsh realities of life. This drama is for them too.”