 A scene from Char Adhyay (1951) [1] a play staged by Bohurupee. | |
| Formation | 1948 |
|---|---|
| Type | Theatre group |
| Location | |
Notable members | Sombhu Mitra, Tripti Mitra, Kumar Roy [2] |
Bohurupee is a Bengali premier theatre group. Bohurupee was founded in 1948 [3] by several active members who left the Indian People's Theatre Association. The group was created to present the experimental Bengali drama in unusual form. [4]
After breaking away from Indian People's Theatre Association, prominent Bengali theatre personalities like Sombhu Mitra, Bijon Bhattacharya created Bohurupee in 1948. The group came into prominence as a composite drama form. This period was a period of struggle for Bohurupee. [4] Between 1950 and 1958 they directed multiple important plays. They staged Rabindranath Tagore's play 'Char Adhyay' in 1951. In 1958, they stage another work of Tagore - Raktakaravi. [4] In Putulkhela (1958), which was a depiction of Ibsen's Doll's House, Bohurupee touched a sensitive contemporary issue in bold manner. Dasachakra (1962) was adapted from An Enemy of the People by Henrik Ibsen.
Utpal Dutt was an Indian actor, director, and writer-playwright. He was primarily an actor in Bengali theatre, where he became a pioneering figure in Modern Indian theatre, when he founded the "Little Theatre Group" in 1949. This group enacted many English, Shakespearean and Brecht plays, in a period now known as the "Epic theatre" period, before it immersed itself completely in highly political and radical theatre. His plays became an apt vehicle for the expression of his Marxist ideologies, visible in socio-political plays such as Kallol (1965), Manusher Adhikar, Louha Manob (1964), Tiner Toloar and Maha-Bidroha. He also acted in over 100 Bengali and Hindi films in a career spanning 40 years, and remains most known for his roles in films such as Mrinal Sen’s Bhuvan Shome (1969), Satyajit Ray’s Agantuk (1991), Gautam Ghose’s Padma Nadir Majhi (1992) and Hrishikesh Mukherjee's breezy Hindi comedies such as Gol Maal (1979) and Rang Birangi (1983). He also did the role of a sculptor, Sir Digindra Narayan, in the episode Seemant Heera of Byomkesh Bakshi on Doordarshan in 1993, shortly before his death.
The culture of Kolkata concerns the music, art, museums, festivals, and lifestyle within Kolkata. It is the former capital of India and, as of 2021, the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal. Geir Heierstad writes that Bengalis tend to have a special appreciation for art and literature.
Suchitra Mitra was an Indian singer, composer, artist exponent of Rabindra Sangeet or the songs of Bengal's poet laureate Rabindranath Tagore, professor, and the first woman Sheriff of Kolkata. As an academic, she remained a professor and the Head of Rabindra Sangeet Department at the Rabindra Bharati University until 1984. Mitra was a playback singer in Bengali films and was associated for many years with the Indian People's Theatre Association.
Bengali theatre primarily refers to theatre performed in the Bengali language. Bengali theatre is produced mainly in West Bengal, and in Bangladesh. The term may also refer to some Hindi theatres which are accepted by the Bengali people.
Sombhu Mitra was an Indian film and stage actor, director, playwright, reciter and an Indian theatre personality, known especially for his involvement in Bengali theatre, where he is considered a pioneer. He remained associated with the Indian People's Theatre Association (IPTA) for a few years before founding the Bohurupee theatre group in Kolkata in 1948. He is most noted for films like Dharti Ke Lal (1946), Jagte Raho (1956), and his production of Rakta Karabi based on Rabindranath Tagore's play in 1954 and Chand Baniker Pala, his most noted play as a playwright.
Shyamanand Jalan was a Kolkata-based Indian theatre director, and actor. He is credited for the renaissance period of modern Indian theatre and especially the Hindi theatre in Kolkata from the 1960s to 1980s. He was the first to perform modernist Mohan Rakesh, starting with Ashadh Ka Ek Din in 1960 and in the coming years bridged the gap between Hindi theatre and Bengali theatre, by mounting Hindi productions of works by Bengali playwrights, like Badal Sircar's Evam Indrajit (1968) and Pagla Ghora (1971), which in turn introduced Sircar to rest of the country. In 2005, he directed his first and only film Eashwar Mime Co., which was an adaptation of Dibyendu Palit's story, Mukhabhinoy, by Vijay Tendulkar.
Khaled Choudhury was a theatre personality and artist of Bengal. He worked for various directors of both Bengali and Hindi plays, including Sombhu Mitra, Tripti Mitra, and Shyamanand Jalan in various capacities — creating the Stage, sets and costumes and later as music director. He was a bachelor. He has been awarded the Padma Bhushan for his contribution to theatre in India's Republic Day Honours List on 26 January 2012. He died on 30 April 2014 in Kolkata.
Tripti Mitra was a popular Indian actress of Bengali theatre and films, and wife of Sombhu Mitra, noted theatre director, with whom she co-founded pioneering theatre group Bohurupee in 1948. She has acted in films like Jukti Takko Aar Gappo and Dharti Ke Lal.
The group theatre of Kolkata refers to a tradition in theatres in the Indian city Kolkata, which developed in the 1940s as an alternative to entertainment-oriented theatres. As opposed to commercial theatres, group theatre is "a theatre that is not professional or commercial", characterized by its tendency for experimentation in theme, content and production, and its aim of using the proscenium stage to highlight social messages, rather than having primarily making-money objectives.
Debshankar Haldar is a Bengali theatre actor with a long career in Bengali theatre groups such as Nandikar, Rangapat, Natyaranga, Sudrak, Gandhar, Bratyajon, Sansriti and Blank Verse. Known for his versatility, he played the role of Debabrata Biswas in ‘Bratyajon’'s production ‘Ruddha Sangeet’, Swami Vivekananda in Lokkrishti's Biley and the historical theatrical figure Sisir Kumar Bhaduri in Indraranga's Nisshanga Samrat. Debshankar has also worked in films.
Shaoli Mitra [alternatively spelt as Shaonli Mitra ; c. 1948 – 16 January 2022) was an Indian Bengali theatre and film actress, director, and playwright. She played the role of Bangabala in Ritwik Ghatak's Jukti Takko Aar Gappo. She is the daughter of Sombhu Mitra and Tripti Mitra, who were also theatre personalities.
Ramaprasad Banik (1954–2010) was a Bengali theatre actor, director and playwright. He also worked in films and televisions. He started his career at a very early age with Putul khela, which was an adaptation of Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House. This play was directed by Sombhu Mitra. Banik was called protégé of the Sombhu Mitra. Banik wrote and acted in many plays for Bohurupee. In 1981 he left Bohurupee he created his own theatre group Chena Mukh. In 1991 he created another theatre group "Theatre Passion" He was a very prominent part of the Nehru Children's Museum theatre classes.
New Empire Cinema is a single screen cinema hall located in Humayun Place in New Market,, Kolkata, West Bengal, India. This theatre is next to Lighthouse Cinema.
Birpurush is a 2010 Bengali drama staged by Kolkata based theatre group Swapnasandhani and directed by Kaushik Sen.
Nabanna is a Bengali language drama written by Bijon Bhattacharya in 1944 and staged by the Indian People's Theatre Association (IPTA) the same year under the joint direction of Sombhu Mitra and Bijon Bhattacharya, and in 1948, by Bohurupee under the direction of Sombhu Mitra. The play is about the Bengal famine of 1943. The Bengal IPTA took the play to many parts of India as a part of its festival, Voice of Bengal, and it became a major success and collected lakhs of rupees for famine relief in rural Bengal.
Kumar Roy (1926–2010) was a Bengali theatre actor, director and playwright. In 1983 he won the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award. He was associated with the group Bohurupee. In 1989 he directed the re-creation of the classic play Nabanna (1948). He was the president of the PashchimBanga Natya Akademi from 2006 till his death in 2010. Kumar Roy was also professor of drama at Rabindra Bharati University, Kolkata and visiting professor at Sangeet Bhavan, Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan.
Char Adhyay 1997 Indian Hindi language drama film written and directed by Kumar Shahani. It is based on Rabindranath Tagore's last novel by the same name, written in 1934.
Bibhash Chakraborty is an Indian Bengali actor and theatre personality. He is also a social activist. He is a prolific writer too. He was associated with Paschim Banga Natya Akademi for many years.