Kal Ke Ird Gird : A Divination Comedy of Eight Careless Muses, A Bespectacled Rabbit and A Chain Smoking Cat
The play was originally written by US-based playwright, director and theatre pedagogue Jeffrey Sichel..

The Collaborators, a Mumbai based new age performance company has announced the details of their soon to be released multilingual physical theatre piece.
Under the direction of Artistic Director Titas Dutta, a group of accomplished young actors is devising a piece sitting in the collective and individual subconscious of their post-colonial, contemporary physical history.
" the basic premise of the arbitrary system has been to not to deconstruct, but to really look at tools of construction in the analysis of text as well as generative and performative modes of working," says Sichel quoting from Postdramatic Theatre by Hans-Theis Lehmann. He also talks about the necessity to create new languages and referring points to assess and practice contemporary performances and also proposes a system of performance creation called the Arbitrary System at the beginning of his play.
Director: TITAS DUTTA

“The biggest challenge has been to restrict the urge of doing a lot and be simple” says director Titas. “Before directing this play, I worked with Jeffrey in two more plays where we worked on two classics by Ionesco and Chekhov, but there we already had a much nurtured strong multi-dimensional narrative. Thus his script provides practically nothing but a series of subjects (characters), objects, a strict vocabulary of physical and verbal actions and a few specific rules to alter the course of actions occasionally; with a strong request that the creators of the play must try to work within the parameters of the system. Here we just have the gist of the arbitrary system and it is impossible to predict what will happen in each scene before it is moved in space. Thus I did a ten days long preparation workshop with the actors before, to invoke the physical memories of the collective subconscious, history ,and mythology. Now they are bringing out perpetual narratives, which talks about different dimensions of contemporary life. I always prefer to work with basic elements of performance – bodies in a space over a definite duration and specifically dig into personal physical history. The process of making ‘Kal Ke Ird Gird’ has been a laboratory experience for me, educational as well as entertaining.”
PROCESS
In an intense residency at The Company Theatre, the actors are being trained. A busy routine of physical and improvisational training. And long hours of construction has been going on.
“I was very skeptical in the beginning as it is mostly out of my comfort zone, all the lines and movements are given by the playwright yet nothing is a given. But in the process it allowed me to break the barriers and put forth the questions about our individual as well as collective subconscious,” says Aditi a renowned contemporary styled dancer from Pune.
"the process has been hard as the play is in multiple cycles and just like the urban life, layer keeps on adding as time passes. According to him, minimalism has worked better as an artistic choice so far," says Himanshu.
"the play is basically standing up to the vulnerability of self within a character and a couple of ever-mutating narratives around those characters for her," adds Prakriti.
“The play portrays our worldly chaos in a worldly manner. It explores visual poetry that at once is surreal but yet, just real enough to see ourselves in those images," says Zubin.
"images only are successful to connect with life individually and globally, when they are solely played by the arbitrary system proposed by Sichel," says Vivek, the co-founder of The Collaborators. “Nothing positive or negative but it just allows reflecting on the journey of human life history in an indifferent manner.”
"THE COLLABORATORS" was founded in the year 2014 by a couple of performers/ theatre enthusiasts trained in various leading institutes such as NSD, FTII, London International School of Performing Arts for research and development of performances across disciplines.Since then the group had successfully staged various productions such as The Y Factor, Hameed ki Eid, Happily Ever After across India. its recent video art Oxymoron is traveling achieving awards in various festivals in India and abroad. Other than that the group runs a camera-acting and a theatre devising workshop and an artists’ jamming session in every three months in Mumbai and Kolkata.
Cast and Crew:
Playwright: Jeffrey Sichel
Direction: Titas Dutta
Assistant: Nishant Kumar
Design: Boomi Nathan
Devised by: Aditi Venkateshwaran Iyer, Himanshu Talreja, Prajakta Salbarde, Prakriti Dutta Mukherjee, Vishal, Vivek Kumar, Zubin Khetani Music and Sound Design: Ramananda Sarkar
Production Design: Saurabh Pratap Singh
Special Support: The Company Theatre
UPCOMING
MUMBAI
Where: Sitara Studio, Garage Gali, Kakasaheb Gadgil Marg, (Near Congress Bhavan, Opposite Indiabulls Finance Centre), Lower Parel, Mumbai 400028
When: 31st March 2018
Time: 6.30 pm & 9.00 pm
PUNE
Where: Sudarshan Rangamanch, Maharashtra Cultural Center, 421/422, Sudarshan Hall, Near Ahilyadevi Girl’s High School, Above Bank Of Maharashtra Shaniwar Peth Branch, Shaniwar Peth, Pune 411030
When: 1st April 2018
Time: 7.00 pm