Mahesh Dattani

The mastermind behind the scene – Mahesh Dattani is a renowned writer, director and actor. Born on 7^th August 1958, he is acclaimed as the finest writer of serious contemporaries that Indian has seen. Dattani began his career as an Advertising copywriter, and then slowly drifted to his passion for writing play. His first play Where There Is Will was written in 1986, followed by a deluge of them. Dance Like A Man in 1989, Tara in 1990, Bravely Fought The Queen in 1991, On a Muddy Night in Mumbai in 1998 and in 2001 the bold play 30 Days in September, and many more.

Dattani’s plays Dance Like A Man, Ek Alag Mausam and Mango Soufflé have been adapted into cinema. He has also written specifically for the big screen, for instance Morning Raaga. As a writer he writes for an actor, for the stage, which then is conceptualized and perfected by the director. Fortunately for him, he gets to serves all the three roles. Almost all the debut performances of his plays are directed by him. This allows his writer eyes to bring to life his script in an exactly manner, and also leave a blue print for other directors to follow.

But the greatest plus point of Mahesh Dattani is his unique treatment of Theatre. Remaining faithful to it, he acknowledges theatre as the best medium of communication between writer and audience via performers. Audience play a very important part in his theatre as it is at them that every play poses a question towards. Hence, Dattani’s plays are merely windows into the life of people. Like mirror they reflect the dilemma, the prejudice, and the hypocrisy of life. Then it is left to the audience to connect and mend their own solutions to the picture.

Mahesh Dattani’s plays are much enjoyable because he writes as an observer where no detail is spared in characterization. His produced realistic work seeks for justice and fairness in the society. His themes touch upon the subjects which make him angry. 30 Days in September depicts sincerely the consequence of child abuse on adult life of a girl. It is a play so powerful that it can make the audience uncomfortable and disturbed enough to tear off the face of child abuse from the society and shred it into pieces. Dance like A Man the evils of patriarchy system and its selective expectations from a Man. Many of his plays portray the reality of Homosexuals.

 Another interesting note on Mahesh Dattani’s flare is his mind-blowing capacity to build a plot of universal sympathy around his realistic characters. His craft never seems to fail. Dattani is the first playwright in English to be awarded the Sahitya Akademi Award. Dance Like A Man has won the award for the Best Picture in English awared by National Panaroma in 1998. His books of plays Final Solution & Other Plays has won Sahitya Academy Award. Mahesh Dattani now resides in Bangalore and works as a full time writer in his dream studio. His is still admen on his quest to display varied content of varied appeal.