Ubra Bachan

Adapted version of Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew
By Ershad Kamol
9 November 2003, 18:00 PM
Vision Theatre, a new group, staged their second production Ubra Bachan at the Mahila Samity Mancha recently. It is the 8th show of the play by Khurshid Alam. The playwright is influenced by famous playwright Muneir Chaudhury's translation Mukhora Ramonir Barshikaran of Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew.

In the play, the playwright has made an attempt to point out some common challenges of the society like unemployment, session jam at the educational institutions, suffering of the students coming from poor families etc. through this light comedy.

To portray hot tempered characters usually minor playwrights make use of the typical Dhakaia dialect and Khurshid Alam has aptly done so. However, some of the characters are multilingual in their speech. As such, the dialogue fiction is not rich enough.

As a director Khurshid Alam is promising and is realistic in his approach. He has used the entire stage for composition and has followed the British comedy style in the case of characterization.

In case of set designing there has been a lack of synchronization. A well-designed set should symbolically reflect the theme of the play and also support the direction which the set design has failed to fulfill.

The simple light designing of renowned light designer Nasirul Haq Khokon is also quite disappointing.

Artistes have been very ordinary in their performance. The group should work with more dexterity and sincerity in future.