READING THE FILM BALA GANDHARVA – Aparna Roy Baliga
Bala Gandharva is a Marathi movie directed by Nitin
Chandrakant Desai. This film is based on the life and times of
the thespian Narayan Sripad Rajhans who was given the name
Bala Gandharva by Lokamanya Tilak for his talent in music
.He joined the Kirloskar theatre company later and became an
acclaimed actor known not only for his musical renderings but
his sensitive portrayal of women characters.
The film opens with the scene of the young Gandharva
performing at a soiree. Then it travels further ten years when
the scene opens as if as an introduction to all the later
scenes which will be replete with references /associations
with the visuals created by Ravi Varma. The scene shows
him imitating Damayanti of the ‘Hamsa Damayanti’
painting by Ravi Varma. Imitation not only of the gesture
but of the costume also is visible. His impersonation
of the female character in its every essence, his effort
to impeccably represent the femininity leaves his wife
amused, like the other women of her times she tries to
identify with the femininity which her husband imbibes
in himself, she speaks about her desire to see him in his
feminine form .A Kantian sense of disinterestedness
seeps in the characterization of the actor in this film, the
filmmaker devises the mirror image. The actor’s daughter
dies, but he chooses to act, gets overwhelmed by the loss
but turns and looks at the mirror and starts singing again
without any sign of despair .Somewhere this scene also
reminds of the concept of sattvika abhinaya of Bharata’s
Natyashastra. Again, the director uses mirrors to show the
exchange of gender roles when on the mirror in front of the
male character the reflection of the actor impersonating
the female is being seen and the other actor playing that
of the male role is being revealed in the mirror in front
of the actor enacting the women’s part .This film offers
frames within frames, the frame that is being constructed
by Bala Gandharava and that by the director. The thespian
chooses the ornaments ,the saris for the characters and
creates a type of femininity which colours the popular
imagination. The popular culture gets influenced in every
sense, there is the fashioning of female identity as well as
that of the male desire. .In one scene, a collector’s wife is
shown in a shop scouting for those type of sarees worn by
Bala Gandharva in his plays, she dresses like a character
tailored by the thespian called ‘Bhamini’. One can draw a
parallel between Ravi Varma and Bala Gandharva ,both
of them were producing types for the spectators. In the
actor’s case, it is he who becomes an icon, his image gets a
circulation for various advertisements just like that o f Ravi
Varma’s oleographs. The entrance of Baburao Painter for
designing the backdrop of the play ‘Draupadi’, the depiction
of the Palace of illusions is also a moment of exploration;
Baburao uses scientific perspective to create the illusion
of depth ,thus the spectators enter into a frame within the
frame of the stage. The actor acknowledges Baburao’s skill
and praises the painter when he praises the palace. This
scene refers to Ravi Varma’s paintings where he is adapting
the backdrops as his background. In the movie, we see the
actor tries to create a pictorial space within the theatrical
space and in Ravi Varma we see the theatrical space being
appropriated by the painter. Even the gestures of the actor
remind of Ravi Varma’s paintings. Throughout the film this
kind of switch over takes place.