The arrival of bold theatre

CHENNAI: Very few stories have the potential to hold curiosity. French production, L’Homme Semence or in English The Seed Giver staged at the Alliance Francaise of Madras on Saturday did just that. Set in the 1980s, a woman is at her marriageable age when a repression that followed the Republican uprising rids her village of all its men. For two years, the women and children wait, with dimming hope and rising sexual frustration. Finally they decide, should a man come their way, he would be shared among the village as common seed for procreation. Directed by Estelle Guihard with actors Anne Bressanges and Nancy Boissel, this French narrative (with English subtitles) certainly pushed Chennai’s theatre boundaries with its sensual expression.In fact, The Seed Giver premiered in Chennai last year, and is presently touring various Alliance Francaise centres in the country. With only two actors on stage, both women – the story is told by the play’s central character, Violette Ailhaud (Anne Bressanges). She recalls a lover who is lost, the death of her father in the uprising, and the long lonesome wait for a man to arrive to meet her female populated village’s throbbing sexual needs. Perhaps the one thing she doesn’t expect when this man arrives, is to fall in love. With powerful acting and live ghatam beats for dramatic effect, this narrative of monologue, dance and mime turned out to be as vivid as it was intense.One of the women in the village, in a symbolic effort to remember her murdered husband-to-be, places a scarecrow on the field dressed in her wedding dress, and beside it, another scarecrow dressed in her husband’s clothes. Such is the tone of desperation and longing reflected in the play. Artfully choreographed scenes ensure that the presence of the man or ‘seed giver’ who arrives later on is made quite real, as Violette fights emotional turmoil at having to share him with the other women. This includes one rather realistic orgasm – one would think that this would be over-the-top for a Chennai stage, but there was no undressing, no inappropriate sound effects, just a vision of long legs and toes curling up sporadically for effect. In the end, more men arrive and the village goes back to normalcy, but their two year drought of men stays fresh in their minds for years to come. Perhaps, a seed of thought was sown for those who watched the play for the first time yesterday. Here we are, complaining about a male dominated nation. Whatever would we do if there weren’t enough of them?