A petitioner in Krishna’s court

A performance of the Kathakali play Santhanagopalam saw spectators moved by a bereaved father’s anguish

The Kathakali plays composed between the 17th and early 20th centuries with stories drawn from the epics deal with the myriad mortal sentiments, interspersed with divine interventions. Some are easily comprehensible, even to the uninitiated. One such play is Mandavappally Ittiraricha Menon’s Santhanagopalam, which unfolds the anguish of a Brahmin who walks into Dwaraka with the corpse of his newborn son, lamenting his fate and presenting his grievances to Krishna. It is quite unusual to have a Brahmin, that too with semi-realistic facial make-up and simple costume, become an aadyaavasaana (principal) character in a Kathakali play, in which Arjuna usually plays a secondary role. The entry of the Brahmin is marked by five slow-tempo kitathikithimtham (a distinctly choreographed component of aangikaabhinaya for a character to establish himself on stage). For the late maestro, Kalamandalam Padmanabhan Nair, the number of the kitathikithimtham was also an indicator of the distance travelled by the character. With the Brahmin’s character — the protagonist — devoid of the spectacular aura that aharya (make-up and costume) generally gives the nayakas (heroes) and pratinayakas (anti-heroes) in Kathakali, it takes theatrical brilliance from the actor to portray the role convincingly. A recent performance of the play at Kunnamkulam turned out to be a delectable experience. Peesappilly Rajeev, an imaginative actor with a penchant for dramatic overtones, played the grief-stricken Brahmin with his characteristic thanmayeebhava (identification), which compelled the spectators to empathise with the character’s emotional turbulence. The Brahmin’s outbursts, alongside Krishna’s detachment — excellently enacted by Adithyan, a talented young actor — carried an unusual aesthetic profundity. The versatile Kalamandalam Shanmukhan convincingly portrayed the shifting moods of Arjuna, who promises to protect the Brahmin’s next child but fails miserably to keep his word.