Chennai's Little Theatre trains rural schoolkids in performing arts

CHENNAI: Tamil theatre plays may not be a thing today in rural areas. But the artform enjoyed a huge separate fan base back then. With a changing lifestyle, and several entertainment avenues, the art was left parched far behind. While there may be a considerable following for theatre plays and acting clubs in educational institutions as extra curricular, why would kids in rural areas be denied that opportunity?

To break this cultural barrier, theatre plays needed to be started from scratch. In that pursuit, recently, The Little Theatre, a Chennai-based theatre group collaborated with the Nagapattinam District Collector’s Office for a rural outreach programme on theatre. “We received a call from the Collector’s Office in early February for a day’s workshop for 150 students. However, it is not feasible but I wanted to do something aligning with that idea. We decided that it would take 15 hours to conduct an effective workshop for small groups of children,” starts Aysha Rau, founder of The Little Theatre.

After finalising the plan, the team, headed by the theatre group’s artistic director Krishnakumar (KK), and three facilitators- Aravindan, Praveen Gunasekaran and Egypt Dinesh, headed to Nagapattinam for a three-day workshop for 81 children from different government schools. “I have been working with children for the past 15 years and our motto is to not just enrich the children but also develop the community. We wanted to take art nearer to them and transform them as confident individuals. The idea is to build their capacity to have healthy interactions and meaningfully use whatever they have learnt to use effectively in future,” says KK.

For the team, breaking the socio-cultural barrier was the most interesting part. The female students were quite hesitant to be next to male students because of the gender divide. Through the Performing Arts Course: Level 1 workshop, The Little Theatre makes sure that veterans in the art field can stay and generate incredible ideas for the forthcoming generation.

“The thought process of both urban and rural landscapes is quite different and we wanted to break that. These rural kids should not feel alienated when they are thrown into the urban atmosphere,” shares KK, who wishes that this programme can be expanded to other districts as well. He was surprised by the enthusiasm of the students. “We broke the power dynamics and asked them to call us by our names. That helped the young minds to break the ice and share incredible ideas. We aimed to create a show that is by, for and of them and it was great to watch how they put together their imagination, cultural point of view and struggles in a play,” he adds.

Praveen Gunasekaran, who has been associated with The Little Theatre for a decade, was one of the facilitators who trained the kids. “This is my first workshop with kids. Bringing everything in a short span of time was quite difficult and Day 1 was the most challenging part. But as time went on and the interactions increased, students became comfortable. One of the harsh realities is that students studying in private schools are mostly exposed to theatre compared to government schools in rural areas. I wish people could focus on arts just like sports, as it will boost the confidence of the kids and rekindle their creativity,” states the 32-year-old.

Another facilitator, Egypt Dinesh went down memory lane while conducting the workshop. He was a part of the theatre group’s workshop when he was a kid, which helped him to navigate through the challenges life threw. “For the rural outreach, instead of implementing our ideas, we helped the children to grow their artistic skills and engage in the production of a play. We could clearly witness their communication and team building skills while they were practising and improving the dialogues,” Dinesh notes.

The kids came up with a play related to environmental protection, in a forest backdrop. “These initiatives will help children overcome stage fear. Moreover, it will break the stigma among the parents about art as a career and they can allow their kids to pursue their dreams without any restrictions in a rural setup,” says the 29-year-old.

Aysha believes that art is required in everyone’s lives to become better human beings. “It brings in sensitivity, and empathy and embraces our emotions, which is absolutely crucial now. I wish to take this initiative to more levels as it helps in the cognitive development of the kids between the age groups 0 and 4, as most of their brain development takes place at that stage,” she concludes.