There are stories that entertain, stories that make us think, and then there are stories that stay with us long after the curtains fall. Bringing theatre, culture and the power of storytelling together, ‘The Thing With Feathers’ explores what it means to hold on to hope when the world around us seems uncertain.
Adyam Theatre has come up with its eighth season in Delhi, presenting ‘The Thing With Feathers’, a production written and directed by Rajat Kapoor. Staged at the OP Jindal Auditorium in Delhi, the play brings together theatre, storytelling and a message of hope, resilience and faith, set against the backdrop of one of the most unsettling times of the 20th century.
Speaking to The Statesman, director Rajat Kapoor and actor Mantra (Puranjit Dasgupta) shared their experiences of bringing the play to life and the journey they went through while creating it.
An optimist himself, Rajat Kapoor describes ‘The Thing With Feathers’ as a play about finding hope and optimism and holding on to faith even in the dreariest of times. While the setting explores a difficult period in history, the play looks beyond despair to explore the human ability to endure, believe and find light in difficult circumstances.
For Rajat Kapoor, bringing the production together was also about finding the right performers who could contribute to the world of the play. Speaking about the audition process, Rajat Kapoor said it was an extensive one, with the idea being to select actors who possessed the skills required for the play and could be good enough even without the text. The discovery process eventually brought together a group of actors who could contribute to the world the production was trying to create.
For Rajat Kapoor, the making of the play was nothing short of an archaeological search, digging, discovering and finding hidden treasures that one may not have had access to before. The process of creating the production became as important as the final performance, allowing the team to uncover different layers of the story along the way.
The play is also co-authored by Rabiah Kapoor and Chandrachur Rai. For Rajat Kapoor, working with his daughter Rabiah was a particularly lovely experience. He spoke about her “special gift with words” and her ability to make connections, describing it as something that is not ordinary.
For actor Mantra, who is part of this journey, the experience of ‘The Thing With Feathers’ has been rewarding, despite what he described as an excruciating creative process. He said every member of the production has put a part of themselves into the play and that it is their collective energy that “makes feathers fly”.
Interestingly, the play did not begin with a conventional script. Mantra explained that it started with a thought and, as a devised piece, the team worked towards that thought each day, creating stories and characters along the way. Rather than beginning with a finished script and building the performance around it, the actors and creative team discovered the play through the process itself.
This unconventional approach also became one of Mantra’s key takeaways from the experience. He said the play taught him that not everything needs to be done “as per the book”. While there may be a standard way of approaching a particular form of art, unconventional methods can sometimes deliver unexpected results.
For Rajat Kapoor, the support provided by Adyam Theatre is an important part of the production. He said the platform’s biggest strength is the budget it provides, allowing productions to receive the support they need and helping theatre reach a wider range of audiences.
Ultimately, ‘The Thing With Feathers’ is not simply about looking back at a difficult chapter in history. It is about what people find within themselves when faced with uncertainty. And for Mantra, the hope is that audiences leave the theatre with a sense of amazement and a connection with the past unlike anything they have experienced before.
- Rajat Kapoor
- The Thing With Feathers
