The tenth and final act of Ramleela on a clear
and cool evening at Cedar Hill, Princes Town found me scanning the magnificent
amphitheatre for evident contemporary meaning beyond the epic play’s known vast
and universal themes.
Thirty years ago, Derek Walcott had delivered
the summation of an experience more expressive of faith than of theatre.
Yet, last Sunday, there was occasion to assess the
difference, if any, between this act of grand street theatre and an unfolding
reality recording alternating wins between circumstances determined to be
“good” and those recorded as being “evil.”
All around the venue stood people as veritable
props willingly summoned to animated attention. Seated was an expanded cast of men,
women and children - applauding, cheering, gasping as barely choreographed
battles and dances filled the space.
I kept my eyes on the little boys “sword
fighting” in preparation for their roles as fierce warriors. Those who forgot
their spears or bows raced anxiously back to parents in the stands and sped
back, weapons in hand.
For Ramleela, we are all found to be witnesses
to our own roles as amateur players moved by emotions theatre typically has the
power to evoke largely as exogenous stimuli, and not as acts of self-belief.
Across the street from
the delightful venue managed by the Cedar Hill Youth, Social and Cultural
Organisation, the MP’s premises remained shuttered and unavailable for public
parking while the MC delivered a hopeful welcome that remained unanswered at
the end.
In the audience of hundreds, a small contingent
of guests transported by the National Trust whose support was recorded more
than once by narrator/host/leader/mentor, Alvin Saltan. Graeme Suite was there
to respond. Corinth/Cedar Hill Councillor Shawn Premchand announced continued
solidarity.
How many, however unmoved by theologies of any
kind, are swept through this - as with the rainy days before - to an
understanding of dharmic conviction embracing civic duty?
Cedar Hill has played this role for over 140
years – a record that is soon to be archived at a purpose-built facility that
already stands as an incrementally developing structure.
This, I thought, was community building of the
kind that has as a philosophical base, what Walcott determined in his Nobel
acceptance speech to be a script not fit for a cast of dramatic amateurs, but
for an assemblage of believers.
This is not unlike Peter Minshall’s “Mas”, in
which the purposes of belief, faith and conviction are captured through street
theatre, music, motion, and defiance … if required.
Of Ramleela’s Felicity cast, Walcott concluded
that “they were not actors. They had been chosen; or they themselves had chosen
their roles in this sacred story … They were not amateurs but believers.”
It was at one such event at the Aranguez
Savannah in the early 1930s my grandfather, who had not long sailed from China and
was now witness to such a spectacle, had initiated a courtship that never died with
my grandmother who was of African heritage.
Decades later, my Uncle Greg would display
Grandma’s photo at the family village in Guangzhou most likely minus the
Ramleela background which has roots in another continent and another time, but
whose branches, leaves and fruits now straddle the globe.
Almost one hour into last Sunday’s performance,
a man out of costume but not quickly determined to be out of place, stepped
forward with what looked like the broken handle of a spade or fork, and struck
one of the lead players in the head.
As the player fell, the cast froze as if on cue
and the attacker threw the weapon on the ground, turned and walked quietly
away.
There was no scuffle. No fight. No wrestling to
the ground. First a sense of scripted violence. Then doubt. Then the sickening
feeling that somehow things had gone dreadfully wrong, as the cast gathered
around an injured man.
Saltan interjected from time to time with words
of encouragement and the assurance that “this has never happened here before.”
“Evident contemporary meaning” had found space
within the storyline. The action resumed after about 30 minutes as the attacker
was handcuffed and led away and the ambulance left. The victim’s role now
played by his son. We were later assured that the victim was “doing okay.”
As the Ravan effigy burned brightly at the very
end, the crowd exited calmly to the bigger stage outside.
