A Prince Maname from Colombo

THEATRE: A few columns back, I promised my readers that I will relate how I happened to play the part of Prince Maname in Dr. Sarachchandra's epoch making creation. I have to track back on my narrative a little bit to do that. I hope readers would not mind.

We were rehearsing the adaptation of 'The Clouds' of Aristophanes' - 'Aththa Kumakda' at that time. One morning I received a telegram at my office. It simply said: "Report for Maname rehearsals at Peradeniya. Shall meet you at Peradeniya Railway Station Saturday evening.

Take the afternoon train - Sarachchandra." Needless to say I was more than surprised. This was something I never expected. Neither had I had even a hint from anybody - least of all from Dr. Sarachchandra - that there would be such a summons.

At first I thought it must be a joke by some mischief maker - a vicious joke if that was true. Then I reasoned that it could not be so. I did not have such 'vicious' friends!

I took the telegram to Mrs. Somi Meegama - the only person that I knew, who knew Dr. Sarachchandra well and who would perhaps have some knowledge about this. This was Friday.

If the telegram is a true one, then I should report tomorrow. I did not know how to contact Dr. Sarachchandra. Mrs. Meegama had a telephone in her home and perhaps she would know how to contact him.

Mrs. Meegama read the telegram and smiled - a bit of a roguish smile I thought. Or, it could simply have been my imagination! "You have been asked to come, so, why don't you go....?" was all, she said. "But, if it's a joke?" I managed to ask. She smiled again. "Why should anyone want to make that kind of joke?" she said calmly. "And you are not that important to be made a joke of? At least not yet!" She added with a tolerant smile.

I took that train to Peradeniya the next day and arrived at the Peradeniya Jn. Railway station around six in the evening. Notwithstanding Mrs. Meegama's subtle assurance, I had been thinking a lot and having all kinds of doubts during the entire journey and I was overjoyed to see Dr. Sarachchandra, Dr. Siri Gunasinghe and Edmund Wijesinghe at the exit gate, waiting to receive me.

I felt very important, I must say. "Hullo Henry, Hullo Machang!" Boomed Edmund W. in his deep, resonant voice, giving me a good thump on the back. I had hardly spoken a word with this man, in spite of seeing Maname so many times.

I was too scared to, but I had a lot of admiration for him because of his stunning performance as the 'Vedi Raju' and here this man was already calling me 'Machang'! "Hullo, Henry, you are right on time..." said a quiet subdued voice and that was Dr. Siri Gunasinghe. Dr. Sarachchandra who said nothing was smiling his child-like smile and was already walking towards his Volksvagen car. We followed him.

Random remarks

None of them uttered anything about the summons even while driving towards the Campus, but picking up from their random remarks, I gathered that they were having a grand opening of the Open Air Theatre at the campus with a performance of 'Maname' and that they had only two weeks to train the new Prince Maname.

My heart must have missed several beats when I realized that I was to be trained as the new Prince, but I pretended not to hear and tried to behave as if this kind of thing happened to me practically every other day...

Dr. Sarachchandra drove his Volksvagen straight to the Arts Theatre of the University. I was taken down a few steps and as we proceeded I heard the distinct sound of drums and a medley of musical instruments being played. We entered a huge hall.

In the middle stood a rusty brown man, his silver grey hair tied into a neat little bun at the back of his head, dressed in a crumpled long sleeved 'jatika beniyama' and a discoloured white cloth. His face bore at least two days of stubble and an inveterate betel chewer's mouth.

He smiled broadly as we approached his domain displaying a set of betel stained teeth unevenly sticking out of his gums -rather like leaning weather beaten pillars of an ancient Dagoba. Nevertheless that smile lit up his stubbled face and his kindly eyes as he was thumping the 'geta beraya', slung across his waist.

A young girl in a long Indian dress was seated in one corner of the floor frowning at a 'Tampura' or a 'Veena' trying her best to either tune the instrument or tame the thing. The hall was full of young men and women engaged in all kinds of prerehearsal activities.

The place looked like it was being prepared for a big do. Some of the activists were stealing glances at the new comer as if to judge his suitability or otherwise for the all important role of Prince Maname....

Tryst

Dr. Sarachchandra looked at me almost apologetically, smiled sweetly and sat at the harmonium while the others looked on. "You know all the songs of Maname, don't you?" He asked casually as he started adjusting the instrument. All this was too suddenly thrust upon me but I could not let myself down. "Only some of them Sir, and that too not very well..." I told him the truth.

Just then from somewhere emerged my old friend from the 'Lama Theeraya' days, the diminutive, dusky little beauty - the present Queen Maname, the rage of the rediscovered Sinhala stage - Trilicia, (then Abeykoon, later Gunawardhana) with a rather mischievous smile on her face. I was about to begin my tryst with Maname.

The facts of the matter emerged slowly. For some reason or another, Ben Sirimanne who was playing Prince Maname had left the cast and the freshly inducted Peradeniya University Arts Circle, under the quiet guidance of Dr. Sarachchandra was in a bit of a spot.

The very first Open Air Theatre Festival of Peradeniya was to be inaugurated with a performance of its celebrated product 'Maname' just two weeks hence and the Prince was missing. Hence all this fuss over me.

Since they could not or had not the time to look for a new Prince from among the students at Peradeniya, they looked at the possibilities of finding a substitute from the actor community in Colombo and I was the choice.

It may have been Trilicia, who knew me from her 'baby' days, who suggested my name and Mrs. Somi Meegama, aware of my acting talents may have further strengthened my candidature. I am still not sure of these surmises.

I could not, and did not ask them direct although I did try to wean the truth from them in a roundabout manner. Now that both of them are gone, my surmises will have to remain as surmises. Anyway...

Anyway, I started rehearsing for Maname that evening itself. Dr. Sarachchandra caressed the harmonium and asked me to sing a couple of songs from Maname. I sang the easier ones such as 'Premayen Mana Ranjithave' and 'Dula nethu pula...' etc. and found to my surprise that even those songs were not that easy. Apparently I sang them too fast and my 'timing' was not all that perfect.

Dr. S puckered his eyebrows and looked at Trilicia when I was not quite there and Trilicia egged me on kindly, standing by the harmonium repeating 'time...!' 'time...!' time and again and quietly toning down my 'laya' or speed or whatever you call it! within half an hour I had realized that playing Prince Maname was not all that easy as I had imagined and that I will have to do some solid hard work, if I am to succeed even partially.

Confidence

Actually, in taking over a role that you had been warbling over indiscriminately, you have to learn to 'undo' most of the things you imagined you knew, and you have to 'do' them over and over again, correctly. Dr. Sarachchandra was a very patient and very mild (if rather sarcastic sometimes) teacher. He hardly ever 'found fault' with you.

He only smiled and you knew you had erred somewhere. Trilicia, my friend, helped me a lot and it was Gunasinghe Gurunnanse, whom I described earlier, who actually embraced the 'New Prince' with all his charm and endearing rusticity and gave me the confidence I needed.

Unused to any kind of 'stylistic' acting, I was terrible with my steps - I mean the stylized walking and the few dance steps involved. Gunasinghe Gurunnanse desisted from faulting me but gave me all the encouragement I needed. He worked hard on my clumsy feet.

He was so kind, often I felt like falling on my knees and worshipping him. To this day, I regret I did not get down to do so - perhaps because of shyness. May his soul forgive me...

I had to take leave and stay over at Peradeniya. They somehow managed to put me on stage on the opening nights of the festival as Prince Maname. First night Trilicia played Queen Maname and on the second night it was Hemamali Gunasekera who played Queen.

Edmund Wijesinghe, Shyamon Jayasinge, Lionel Fernando and a host of the original cast had the privilege of appearing at the opening of the new Open Air Theatre, which has now been renamed as the 'Sarachchandra Open Air Theatre.' If I am not mistaken, this was in August or September 1957 - I must be having a record of it in one of my diaries. I cannot trace them now.

Some time back I enquired from Peradeniya about the event. They have no records of it. At least so they told me.

Out of the lot, I consider myself the most privileged. I was the only outsider the man from Colombo, among a host of university students.

That was a night to remember indeed.

It was a full-moon night and the moon under a clear sky had woven all its magic over a spellbound audience. Those who could not secure a seat on the ground were peering in from balconies of the surrounding college houses.

Some of the pretty women in the hostels leaned against the balconies with their loose hair shimmering in the moonlight, their brows drawn tight to have a good look at the New Prince!

Thought of the week

Thank you, Rupavahini, for telecasting Titus Thotawatte's 'Handaya' the other night. I was more or less moved to tears watching this brilliant cinematic creation by our beloved 'Ti Mahattaya'. I remembered how, in those good old days of black and white Cinema, children of this country flocked to our cinema halls to see this marvel.

No cinema director has created anything like 'Handaya' for our children ever since. This category of film making is a badly neglected art in our country - in fact almost non-existent. As a participant of this internationally acclaimed creation I felt privileged to have been associated with 'Ti Mahattaya' in this difficult venture.

He has been honoured, but not enough, for ALL the work he has painstakingly done for our children. The dubbing of Children's films and cartoons was started by him at the Rupavahini Corporation - he was the pioneer in this field in our country.

Famous creations such as 'Oshin', Dr. Dolittle, and Malgudi Days would never have reached a majority audience in this country if not for our 'Ti Mahattaya'. I am amazed that no university in this country has conferred a Doctorate on him in recognition of his massive contribution to the cinema and the electronic arts of our times.

By the way, 9.40 p.m. is far too late an hour for children's fare. Perhaps the Rupavahini Corporation will take note.

..................................

<< Artscope Main Page