National Theatre, Sept 20.

 Sept 20

    Today we started early and met Maura at Charing Cross. We exchanged the last of our non-legal tender with Maura at her bank. Then, we walked to St Martin's in the Fields and ate a wonderful lunch in the Crypt. (All three of us had tomato soups and salads.) The profits support the unsheltered.

   

    Then we walked across the Thames to the South Bank where we all had a coffee in the National Theatre's cafe. We had tickets (thanks to Maura) for a matinee in the Olivier Theatre for The Father and the Assassin." It was about the life of Gandhi's assassin which made it a play about the slide toward the brutal partition of India and Pakistan and the 2,000,000 lives that were lost.  Little is known about Nathuram Godse, the assassin, partly because Prime Minister Nehru banned his statement at his trial from publication. 

    The play was written by Anapama Chandrasekhar.  Despite its heavy theme, there was a great deal of humor and the fourth wall was broken on several occasions. 

   As expected from the National Theatre, it was a top-notch production in every way. The set was creative and mobile. The choreography of the actors on the set was impressive. With the lighting and shadowing, there were times when the actors realistically conjured up crowds of thousands.

   Interestingly, the play was directed by Indhu Rabasingham who directed the play about North Korea that we saw with Maura several years ago, The Great Wave."  

    The acting was superb all round, but especially by the lead, Hiran Abeysekera, who played the assassin. As one review wrote, he was "playful and wicked, inviting us to spend time with a murderer." Abeysekera played the lead in the Life of Pi at the National Theatre for which he won an Olivier Award. He covered every bit of the stage and acted from his childhood until his death by hanging. He and Gandhi meet in the afterlife as well. 

    It is also an interesting look at identity and gender. Godse was raised by his parents as a girl after the death of three sons. Godse eventually rebels and endeavors to become a boy, then a man.

     He gets swept up, first by Gandhi's idealistic vision and nonviolence (ahimsa), but later feels betrayed by that and then succumbs to the Hindu nationalistic movement, wanting to keep India for Hindus only. It is clear that the play is influenced by the current rise of nationalism which is captured chillingly in the play's conclusion when Godse turns to the audience and urges them to purify their language and enforce racial boundaries. Barbara and Maura did not like that Godse got the last word in the play, but Mark thought it was the only way to end it.  Maura and Barbara would have preferred that Gandhi have the last word.

   After that, we went to Pizza Express for a very good pizza.