A western style retelling of Hindu epic ‘The Maharabatha’
Pick of the week in Children’s Time Out, Anu’s first professional production was Waterfall.
This story is based on the Hindu myth of the Goddess’ Ganga’s descent to this planet. Ganga is a River Goddess and trickles to Earth through Lord Shiva’s hair to put some dead children’s soul’s to rest.
The original story is in the Hindu epic “The Maharabatha”. Anu worked with Claire Burrell to recreate this myth as a western style fairy tale, retelling the story in the traditional dance drama form of India.
This piece meshed two stories
One of a British born Indian’s journey to find a place for herself and the story of Ganga’s descent to earth. The philosophy used for the creation of this piece was that of the VEDAS , the most ancient of Hindu philosophies.
The Vedas teach us that there is no place between two places for searching souls… we should all seek a path of JOY for our souls rather than PLEASURE for our ego, therin we will find the truth of the fire that burns in the lotus flower that sits in the castle of our soul…
“More than ten years later from this production and study, I still find myself inching forward on this journey…”
A Community Arts Project
Waterfall was a community arts project in conjunction with the children of Greenwich Hindu Temple.
It was supported by The Arts Council, The Paul Hamlyn Foundation and The Baring Foundation
Credits
Music: Nitin Sawhney
Choreography: Claire Burel, Akram Khan & Shamita Ray
Cast:
Leena Patel – Wise woman, child, mother
Anu Kumar – Lost girl
Shamita Ray – Horse
Kalyani Shiva – Indra
Andrew Okaba – King Sagara, Bhagareeth
Premita Rattan – Ganga’s voice
and King Sagara’s Children played by members of the youth group at Greenwich Hindu Temple and surrounding Boroughs.
Set: Billy Crowe & Flora Cooke
Lighting: Tesh
Sound: Ben Davies
Written, produced & designed: Anu Kumar
Devised: Anu Kumar, Claire Burrell & the cast
Clip1 – the lost girl begins her journey to find her place, she is introduced to the character of king Sagara
Clip 2 – the lost girl begins her journey to find her place , she is introduced to the character of king Sagara
Clip 3 – a beautiful white horse is seen dancing with Indira
Clip 4 – The children kill the mesmerising horse and so invoke the wrath of a meditating sage, all the children die. King Bhagareetha does a fire dance to pray for the Godess Ganga to come down.
