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Ramu Ramanathan

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ramu Ramanathan
Born (1967-12-29) 29 December 1967 (age 56)
NationalityIndian
EducationBachelor of Science, Chemistry, University of Mumbai, 1988
SpouseKinnari Vohra
Websiteplacesotherthanthis.blogspot.com

Ramakrishnan Ramanathan, known as Ramu Ramanathan, is an Indian playwright and director. He has written plays including Mahadevbhai, Cotton 56, Polyester 84, Jazz, Comrade Kumbhakarna, and Postcards From Bardoli.

His book 3, Sakina Manzil And Other Plays,[1] is a collection of eight plays, published by Orient Blackswan in collaboration with the English and Foreign Languages University (EFLU).[2]

Besides playwriting, Ramanathan is the editor of PrintWeek and WhatPackaging? magazines. He has been associated with the print industry for 30 years.[3]

He is the author of three books. 3, Sakina Manzil And Other Plays which is a collection of eight plays. And, two collections of poems, My Encounters with a Peacock and To Sit on A Stone - And Other Shorts.[4] In addition, he pens columns for newspapers.

He has also co-edited Book Binding with Adhesives along with P Sajith and Babri Masjid, 25 Years ... along with Irfan Engineer and Sameena Dalwai.

Early life

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Ramanathan was born on 29 December 1967 in Kolkata and later moved to Mumbai. He completed his schooling at St. Stanislaus High School, Mumbai. In 1987, Ramanathan graduated from Mithibai College with a bachelor's degree in chemistry. That same year, he wrote his first one-act play, I Am I. Later, he completed his Diploma in Journalism from Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, Mumbai, and an MA in English Literature from the University of Mumbai.

Later, Ramanathan wrote 13 one-act plays for inter-collegiate competitions. He also wrote radio plays and radio documentaries for AIR, produced by S. D. Prins, a rare motivated officer in Akashvani. Along with Sunil Shanbag, he explored alternative spaces for plays, such as on top of a water tank at the YWCA in Andheri, which was transformed into an amphitheatre. He founded and organized the IIT Theatre Fest in 2006 with Raja Mohanty at the IDC in IIT. For ten years, he edited a theatre journal for Prithvi Theatre called PT Notes, published by Sanjna Kapoor. Later, he co-edited the eSTQ bulletin from 2005. He also ran a play-reading movement for many years, in which more than 75 unperformed and unpublished plays in English, Gujarati, Hindi, and Marathi were read in front of an invited audience.

Publications

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  • Combat, published by National School of Drama (2003)
  • Collaborators And Mahadevbhai, Sahitya Akademi (2006)
  • Tathasthu ("So Be It"), in The Little Magazine (2010)has
  • Mahadevbhai (in Marathi), Popular Prakashan (2011)
  • 3 Sakina Manzil and Other Plays (in English), Orient Blackswan (2012) - An anthology of eight plays: Shanti, Shanti It’s A War; The Boy Who Stopped Smiling; Curfew; Mahadevbhai (1892–1942); Collaborators; 3, Sakina Manzil; Shakespeare And She; Jazz.
  • Book Binding with Adhesives along with Tony Clark and P Sajith
  • My Encounters With a Peacock, Red River (2017)
  • Babri Masjid, 25 Years .. along with Irfan Engineer and Sameena Dalwai (Gyan Prakashan) (2017)
  • To Sit on A Stone - And Other Shorts, Red River (2020)
  • Mumbai Murmurings: 213* Tiny Tales of Theatre (Manipal Universal Press) (2023)
  • Two plays: Cotton 56, Polyester 84 and Comrade Kumbhakarna, Red River (2023)

Theatre experience

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Ramu Ramanathan, Group Editor, PrintWeek India and Campaign India

In 1993, Ramanathan wrote Shanti, Shanti, It's a War, which won Best Play at The Hindu - All India Playscript Competition. This play was produced by Madras Players. It was penned in 1992, within the first ten days after 6 December.

In the mid-nineties, he wrote and directed a Gripps play (a children's play) called The Boy Who Stopped Smiling, which was performed in approximately 150 shows. More than one hundred of these shows were organized by Sanjna Kapoor, the play's producer, who created a theatre network across the country.

Ramanathan directed Vaikom Mohammed Basheer’s Me Grandad 'Ad an Elephant and later Marguerite Duras’ L’amante Anglaise (both with university students), as well as Samuel Beckett's Krapp's Last Tape, Jean Genet’s Deathwatch, Václav Havel’s Audience, and a play called Nothing (for V Theatre Group).

Similarly, his collaboration with a group of architecture students resulted in three plays and another piece called PM @ 3 pm. This group hosted 7-day workshops on set design and theatre aesthetics, and fabricated four model sets of King Lear for four language theatre directors in Mumbai. Later, the group staged three student productions: Yaar, What’s the Capital of Manipur!; The Sanjivani Super Show; and Medha and Zoombish – II.

Ramu Ramanathan has conducted workshops for students and taught at KRIVIA, IDC (IIT Powai), the University of Mumbai, and Symbiosis (Pune). He has also been associated with at least 20 educational institutes across the country.

Playwriting

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Title Year Acclamation
I Am I; What It Is; Gagan Mahal; Etc. (1987 to 1993) Award-winning inter-collegiate one-act plays
Nothing – A Play Without Words 1990
Shanti, Shanti, It’s A War 1993 All India Best Play Award awarded by The Hindu
The Boy Who Stopped Smiling 1998
Curfew 1999 Premiered at the Prithvi Theatre Festival
The Travel Show 2000 Premiered at the Prithvi Theatre Festival
Yaar, What’s The Capital Of Manipur! 2002
Combat 2002 Premiered at the Kala Ghoda Festival
Mahadevbhai 1892-1942 2002
Collaborators 2003 Regional Award Winner of the BBC International Radio Playwriting Competition
Medha And Zoombish 2004
3, Sakina Manzil 2004
Chello Ank(in Gujarati) 2004 Bagged the best play award for the Bhupen Khakkhar Playwriting Competition organised by Mumbai Samachar, Friends of Bhupen Khakkar, Image Publications and Coffee Mates.
Cotton 56, Polyester 84 2006 Bagged the META best play and best playwright award[5]
Three Ladies Of Ibsen 2006
Medha And Zoombish II 2007
Shakespeare And She 2008
Jazz 2008
Kashmir Kashmir 2009
Comrade Kumbhakarna 2011
The Diary Of A Word 2012
Postcards From Bardoli 2013

Theatrical adaptations

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Title Year Adapted from
Translator Of Ded Inch Upar (Into English) 1997 Hindi original by Nirmal Verma
L’ Amante Anglaise (In English) 2002 Based on French play by Marguerite Duras
Steppenwolf 2002 Based on Herman Hesse’s novel in German. Staged as part of the Herman Hesse Celebrations at Max Mueller Bhavan, Mumbai
The Train To Argentina 2002 Theatrical adaptation of play by Thuppatan
Gandhi Katha 2003
The Sanjivani Super Show 2004 Adaptation of Adya Rangacharya’s Kannada play, SANJIVANI
A Play About A Painter 2004 Edoardo Erba’s Italian drama

Direction

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Title Year Notes
Krapp’s Last Tape 1989 Playwright: Samuel Beckett
Deathwatch 1991 Playwright: Jean Genet
Audience And Mistake (actor &c-Director) 1994 Playwright: Vaclav Havel
Credit Titles 1997 Playwright: Vijay Padki. A staged play-reading
The Boy Who Stopped Smiling 1998
Me Grandad ‘Ad An Elephant 1998 Theatrical adaptation of the Malayalam novella by Vaikom Mohammed Basheer, into a dramatized presentation (Group co-ordination & direction) 1998-99
Angst. Angst. Coontah. Coontah. Boom. Bam. Dhandal. Dhamaal. Kaput. (Concept And Direction) 2001 Premiered at TECHFEST, IIT Mumbai
Time To Tell A Tale 2001 Co-produced with Katha Publishing and SNDT, University
Yaar, What’s The Capital Of Manipur! 2002 Co-produced by Kamala Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute of Architecture
Mahadevbhai 1892–1942 2002 Premiered at the Prithvi Theatre Festival 2002
L’ Amante Anglaise (in English) 2002 Co-produced by Alliance Francaise, Mumbai
The Train To Argentina 2002 Premiered at the Varkhari Kerala Theatre Festival in Mumbai, on 25 December 2002
Gandhi Katha 2003 Staged reading, premiered at the Gujarati Forbes Sabha’s book launch of Narayan Desai’s four-volume biography on Mahatma Gandhi, in Mumbai on 2 October 2003
The Sanjivani Super Show 2004 Staged during the 100th Birth Anniversary of the Adya Rangacharya, at Mysore Association, Mumbai
Collaborators 2003
A Play About A Painter 2004 Edoardo Erba’s Italian drama
Medha And Zoombish 2004
Arabian Night 2004 Play by Ronald Schimmelpfennig
Medha And Zoombish II 2007
Shakespeare And She 2008

References

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  1. ^ "Playing with Words". 25 June 2012.
  2. ^ "3, Sakina Manzil and Other Plays".
  3. ^ "Author - Ramakrishnan Ramanathan". kalnet.kshec.kerala.gov.in. Retrieved 11 November 2023.
  4. ^ "RAMU RAMANATHAN". Jaipurliteraturefestival.org. 17 September 2013.
  5. ^ "Mahindra Excellence in Theatre Awards".
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The Eleventh Dr. Ashok Da Ranade Memorial Lecture: 8 ½ Reasons Why We Need Playwrights Today

Mumbai Local with Ramu Ramanathan: Voices of Dissent

Ramu Ramanathan: My favourite poets from KrakowVijay Tendulkar Biography by Ramu Ramanathan (Part 1)

Vijay Tendulkar Biography by Ramu Ramanathan (Part 2)

Ramu Ramanathan speaks to the translators of the books: Delhi and Anticlock - Fathima EV, Nandakumar K and Ministhy S