One humid morning in Byculla: tiatr tales of another time Roland Francis roland.fran...@gmail.com
It was around ten that humid morning and much of the perspiring Goan population of Byculla was streaming into the wide gates of the magnificent Gloria Church for the Sunday high mass. Ladies were in their Sunday best, some of them with hats, gloves and stockings but all of them in veils covering their hands. The men in their starched shirts and cotton light summer jackets remained behind, keeping in mind an exit route should the priest repeat his tendency to a long and boring sermon. Around the corner of the church outside a small bookstore selling rosaries, medals and all forms of tiatr literature, song books and of course tiatr tickets, was Peter Fernandes the owner. Although this was his peak business time he was more interested in chatting with his favorite actor Robin Vaz. A six footer and handsome to boot, Robin was lounging near the church not so much to watch the fine Goan ladies and men who entered first into the church's nave but the more plebeian crowd that followed. The domestics, the nearby Mazagon Dock and Port Trust workers families and the simple people who inhabited the warrens of the massive Bombay Improvement Trust (BIT) Blocks, locally called cement chawls. These buildings were in the middle of the mile-long Love Lane that started a couple of blocks from the church. For it was these people that would be the main crowd of his 'Agente Monteiro' that was to debut in the St. Mary's school hall only a few bus stops away. Of course there were to be other crowds for this showing. The Goans in Mazagon Terrace, in D'Lima Street, in the environs of Matarpakady Village and Gunpowder Lane and the lower reaches of Mazagon Hill. No, he was not afraid of a lack of patrons. He knew his popularity and the crowds that he could draw ever since he came onto the Konkani stage popularizing the mandos through a stage form. He was a dancer as much as an actor. If there was any doubt about the crowds, it would be dispelled by the star cast of Jacinto Vaz, C Alvares, H Britton, Kid Boxer, Minguel Rod, M Boyer, Remy Colaco, Seby Coutinho, Anthony Mendes, Alfred Rose and Souza Ferrao who were all going to be there, either on the stage or in the crowd. Robin Vaz was every tiatrist's friend and they were keen on supporting this debut. The tiatr acting and support worker crowd was a close knit community. They lived their own lives often out of the circles of the general Goan population in Bombay. They were mostly employed in their own occupations and came together only on weekends. The money they received was far less in comparison to their love for the acclaims, the hoots, the whistles and the catcalls for encores they received when their performances were eagerly lapped up by the crowds. They were prey to two big faults. They drank, right up to the paths leading to the start of the act, sometimes even just behind the curtains before they went up and almost immediately again after they were lowered. The other was a complete lack of interest in the finances their plays generated. They could have been rich men but lived one month to the other, mostly because they let the organizers, the financiers and the agents loot them under their very noses. It was as they say, one for the love, and none for the money. Robin Vaz was now alert and no longer lounging against the wall of Peter Fernandes' shop. The crowds he was watching once going in were now coming out after the service and he was here for this very moment. They were going to talk about the evening's play and he wanted to know what they were saying. Whom they wanted to hear between the curtains (pordde), the local lingo for the acts of the play. It was what happened then, that would make or break the play. The skits, the songs, the music of the live bands, the jokes on Bandodkar and the recent liberation. Kid Boxer could be depended on to make fools of the minions of the new Indian government even though there would be plain-clothes Bombay police watching in the crowds because of the play's name. No one recognized Robin Vaz. He wore loose clothing and was standing discreetly in the shadows. Everybody had an opinion, but one thing came out clearly -- with such a star cast they wanted the songs and jokes repeated twice and thrice. And they wanted to see Robin Vaz dance. That was their must. Robin was happy, he had heard what he wanted to hear and he would arrange the sequence like they wanted it. The talent and versatility of the tiatrists in Bombay was something to be amazed at and so were the bands they organized for the plays. They barely had any rehearsals. They hardly learned any lines. Under a mushroom cloud of Aunty's vapors, they scanned the sheets comprising the play and only then did they determine the nuances of their performances. Much would depend on where the tiatr would be staged, in which hall and opposite whom and with whom they would be performing. They knew each other so well that on stage, it was easy to anticipate what the other was going to say, how and before he said it. Veteran crowds knew that too, and instead of spoiling their joy, this knowing, only enhanced it. If these tiatrists were in more professional settings, they would easily have given Hollywood Oscar performers a run for their money. If you ever saw Anthony Mendes, Souza Ferrao, J P Souzalin and the other masters doing their thing, you would know what I mean. The bands comprised of musicians who took their art seriously, but as young boys, we laughed at their dress and their mannerisms. To us, they were distinctly uncool. But these were men who were honed. They plied their trade with international bands passing through Bombay, in the pits of orchestras of musical events for the city elite, in the music interludes of the silent films of the era and in the grand cinemas when playing the British and then the Indian national anthems before any Hollywood movie could start. Many of them had retired from playing in Maharaja's dance bands at balls for visiting dignitaries and for British regimental ceremonies. They could play the Bridge on the River Kwai with equal facility as Beguine the Begin or Mac The Knife or any Louis Armstrong favorite. The Bombay tiatrs were lucky to get them. They were often booed and jeered as the crowds wanted them to end so that the play act could begin but to anyone who could understand or appreciate music, they were maestros. And the funny thing is that they could be found lounging outside Alfred Restaurant in Dhobitalao, looking for odd work, sometimes for pennies on the dollar. It was evening now and Robin Vaz along with a few of the performers were seated inside Monteiro's Moonshine place just outside the venue downing their last drinks. A few cars were being parked, it was 10 minutes past starting time and they were wound tight as drums and well up the proverbial tree. In other words, they were ready for the big screen and eager and willing to give their best. Robin was going to be Agente Monteiro himself, the big, bad Paclo in whose unkind hands would rest the fate of any Indian political trouble makers within Goa and at the end of whose revolver barrel would lie the lives of many satyagrahis entering Goa with the implicit permission of the Nehru coterie and the express prohibition of the Portuguese government. He was meant to be a villain to the pro-Indians in the crowd and a hero to the pro-Portuguese. He had to fill in both roles and needless to say he discharged them both well. So did the rest of the performers, every last man and woman of them. At the end the crowd clapped, stomped, yelled and whistled. The auditorium shook and old Fr Bonifacio Dias, the kindly Goan Jesuit tiatr-loving priest under whose dispensation the hall was given out for the purpose, muttered under his breath about talking to the tiatrists not to drink as much the next time. He knew that kindness and mercy, forgiveness and excellence, all came out for a Goan, from the bottom of a bottle. -- Canada-based Roland Francis can be contacted on 416-453-3371 or via email roland.fran...@gmail.com Feeback, comments welcome. Goanet Reader is edited and compiled by Frederick Noronha f...@goa-india.org --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Protect Goa's natural beauty Support Goa's first Tiger Reserve Sign the petition at: http://www.goanet.org/petition/petition.php ---------------------------------------------------------------------------