PAPER 4 Detail Study Of Kathak, Nautch Girls, Nritta, Nritya, Different Gharana-s, Present Status, Institutions, Artists Module 25 Kathak In Films Kathak has been easily and freely assimilated in mainstream cinema. This has been possible due to language outreach (Hindi/Urdu/Punjabi/Awadhi/Bhojpuri) and also due to cultural closeness of the subject. Kathak was story-telling in temples and thus the same devise has been easily adapted in Hindi films. The stories of nautch dancers, or tawaifs, or courtesans or, classical dancers have all added to body of film works. The first full-length feature film made in India - Raja Harish Chandra - used north Indian dances minimally and Kathak being from north and central India, had easy access and viewership. This 1913 Indian silent film was directed and produced by Indian icon Dadasaheb Phalke. The film had an all-male cast as no woman was available for playing female leads. Phalke struggled to get women, including nautch girls, to agree to act in the film. He hence had to cast a delicate- looking man Anna Salunke/अꅍना साल Ԃके to play the role of Queen Taramati, Harish Chandra’s wife. Phalke discovered Salunke, who used to work in a restaurant as a cook, for this role. Salunke would later play the role of both Rama and Sita in 1 Phalke’s 1917 film Lanka Dahan and become the most popular actor of his time.1 The plethora of mythological films introduced a different slant to the use of music and dance in Hindi cinema. As the formula for romantic and soulful rendition of song and a simplistic dance number by the heroine could not apply to the gods and goddesses of mythology, such films required greater emphasis on dance. Most heroes or heroines could not dance and the notion of choreography did not exist. Consequently, studios contracted trained classical dancers from different parts of the country. Interestingly, the initial dances in films were by the best dancers in the country who conceptualized and choreographed for them. Directors gave the dancers basic instructions and guidelines and song and dance numbers with elaborate sets and costumes were posturized to add to the fantasy of ‘Devlok’ or ‘Indralok.’ Trained classical dancers such as Sitara Devi and later Gopi Krishna and western style dancer Azoorie kicked off the popularity of the classical dance form in Hindi films. These dancers were so popular that the film posters highlighted “dances by Sitara Devi.” Dance masters such as Prof. More often composed these elaborate stage dances. As dancing became more popular the need for dance masters and later choreographers was felt. Azoorie, one of the popular dancers of the very early days, trained two boys Surya Kumar and Krishna Kumar who in turn started training actors to dance to their own tunes. Choreographers such as P. L. Raj, Satyanarayan, 2 Badriprasad and a host of others came in then.2 The era of dance started in Hindi films with the entry of trained dancing actresses Padmini, Ragini and Vyjayanthimala from the south. In any film featuring these actresses there would definitely be dance! 1940s: Uday Shankar’s seminal film Kalpana, the first fully choreographed film released in 1948 also had portions on Kathak. The story of this film was based on dance. This reached out to many as the film had a national release. S.S. Vasan’s Chandralekha had choreography by Tarun Chopra, a disciple of Uday Shankar. Ram Gopal too used Kathak sequences in his films, making it internationally popular. Zohra Sehgal is special because she showcased the Uday Shankar dance style in film two years before Kalpana was released. That film was Neecha Nagar (1946, Hindi), and her contribution was two beautiful dances (a "twin" and "trio" dance) with graceful side sways, undulations, arm positions, and hand gestures that look directly inspired by the Uday Shankar style as evidenced from extant footage of Kalpana. Her daughter Kiran Sehgal’s book Fatty sheds some light on the influence Zohra had on dance through her training of everyone associated with Prithvi Theatres. Kiran notes that students, Suresh Bhatt and Satyanarayan, later went on to give dance direction in films, and she also lists Badnam (directed by DD Keshav) as one of Zohra's film choreographies. Kiran notes that the female dancers identified in the credits of Neecha Nagar, Ruma Ganguly and Gopa Lal, were students of Zohra at Prithvi Theatres!3 3 Kathak soon gained currency in mainstream Hindi cinema of Bombay and many dancers were trained in Kathak like Sadhona Bose, Devika Rani, Waheeda Rehman, Meena Kumari, Sandhya Shantaram among others. Sadhona Bose was a contemporary of Uday Shankar. A classically trained dancer (Kathak dance under Taraknath Bagchi and Manipuri under Guru Senarik Rajkumar) Tough Sadhona was an actress she was a dancer first and all her film successes were in dancing roles. She even sang her own songs in some of her films including her first Alibaba. An English version of her best-known film, Raj Nartaki (1941) was distributed in the USA as Court Dancer. 1950s: Most of the Kathak found in Indian films tends toward the courtesan/mujra style of Kathak with a focus on abhinaya (expressive interpretation), lyrical poetry, and a slower pace to show off the dancer's feminine charms. In cases where the pace quickens to feature footwork and spins, the dances still aren’t up to par and the dancer's lack of lengthy Kathak training usually shows (or in the case of Jhanak Jhanak Payal Baaje, the dancer - Gopi Krishna - is clearly trained but "spices up" the dance for film so much that it strays from classical Kathak). Film Kathak often features close-up shots of the dancer’s footwork, but it’s almost always a shadow of the real thing. There are a few film dances, however, that are gleaming exceptions to the rule in their presentation of rhythmic, technical Kathak, and the star of this style is undoubtedly Kumari Roshan. Roshan’s dance style was certainly a product of her training in the Jaipur gharana of Kathak. In the 1959 Bengali film Jalsagar directed by Satyajit Ray, Roshan performs a 4 "trivet," a fast-paced dance item popular in the Jaipur style but rarely performed today. In the historical film Mirza Ghalib (Hindi, 1954) set in the time of the “magnificence of the court of the last Mughal” the story follows the romance of the Indian poet Mirza Ghalib and a dancer who was played by Roshan. Roshan Kumari is said to have danced in quite a few Bengali and Hindi films, one of which was Basant Bahar (Bengali, 1957). In Parineeta (Hindi, 1953), we have a double- whammy with Roshan Kumari and Gopi Krishna as performers! Gopi Krishna wowed with his effortless turbo-spins and Roshan had delightful form in the way she holds herself.4 V. Shantaram made films based on dance characters as his own partner Sandhya, whom he married later, was an accomplished folk dancer knowing many classical forms; thus many of his films from Jhanak Jhanak Payal Baje (1955) to Jal Bin Machchli Nritya Bin Bijalee (1971) used Kathak heavily. The latter film had a plot which allows almost everyone to declare their willingness to sacrifice themselves for love, or for dance, or for the love of dance. Though earlier Sandhya had almost given up dancing because of backache, she staged a comeback as a dancer in this picture with a vengeance. Her snake dance, beautifully shot outdoors, is a visual delight. One must remember where, when and how dance came in films! Each film had minimum of 6 to 8 songs (RPM and LP vinyl records had two sides and each side had 3 to 4 songs) thus, each film had 6-8 songs and most songs had to be danced or enacted to a storyline. Thus films gave allowance for such 5 depiction through song and dance, thus also earning the sobriquet from international cinema community (and audiences) that Indian films were all “song and dance” story or sequence, which could also be demonstrated by dance. As Kathak was the only north Indian form, it became very popular and thus won instant audiences. Folk forms were also very easily involved and thus dance permeated all aspects of film making. 1960s: Many actresses came from south India and brought Bharatanatyam with them; and this also helped pan Indian audiences see this form. By then the Bombay film industry had benefit of great gurus like Lachchu Maharaj, Kundanlal Gangani, Mohanrao Kalyanpurkar who composed dance sequences using Kathak. Pandit Lachchu Maharaj of the Lucknow gharana made a significant contribution to Hindi film choreography. The first main film using story of a dancer - a courtesan - Anarkali was Mughal-E-Azam (1960), in which the great K. Asif used Madhubala who danced mostly Kathak, composed by Lachchu Maharaj and Shambhu Maharaj. Mughal-e-Azam enchanted audiences with its majestic sets, elaborate dance sequences and soulful music. The dance sequences featuring Madhubala and hundreds of junior artistes took the audience’s breath away. Anarakali was a nautch dancer with whom young prince Salim (played by a young Dilip Kumar alias Yusuf Khan) falls in love much to the dislike of his father, the King, played by theatre doyenne Prithiviraj Kapoor. 6 Pakeezah was another film choreographed by Pt. Lachchu Maharaj with elaborate Kathak dance sequences. The film tells the story of a Lucknow tawaif played by actress Meena Kumari. All the Kathak dance sequences were performed by an ailing Meena Kumari herself except for the last dance sequence wherein a body double (Padma Khanna) was used in the long- shots.