All her life’s a stage

If she looks familiar, allow us to refresh your memory — Luck By Chance, Delhi-6, Parzania. Small but impressionable roles.

Actor Sheeba Chaddha says she trusts her instincts while selecting a role, and it is clear that her intuition has not let her down.

In the city soon to portray the role of one of Henrik Ibsen’s strongest women characters, Hedda Gabler, Chaddha says she is yet to watch any performances of the play, the title character of which has previously been brought to life by legendary actresses such as Ingrid Bergman and more recently, Cate Blanchett.

“It’s deliberate,” she explains, “I may watch it out of curiosity about the play, but even then, only after I’m done with my performance.”

Chaddha’s love affair with the stage happened while she was still a teenager, after watching a Sheela Bhatia musical: “Nothing has stirred me as much as theatre,” she reveals, recalling how she was admitted to college through the dramatics quota and made it a point to work in at least one important play a year. Her association with drama troupe Chinkari and work with Rajat Kapoor’s A Monologue happened soon after. “One thing led to another. I never had to go in search of it too much.”

Chaddha’s talent earned her the coveted Charles Wallace scholarship, which paved the way for a theatre course at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts (RADA) in London.

She was an apprentice to theatre personality Phillipe Genty in Paris, known for his illusions on stage and use of psychoanalytical concepts formulated by the likes of Freud and Jung, and Chaddha calls him “fantastic” as a “master craftsman and magician”.

“Phillipe works from an idea and not a script, with complete openness. People start work as early as nine in the morning. He follows a very structured method,” she says. And would India be ready for productions like Genty’s? “Of course, with art, it either works or doesn’t. So if it has been accepted once, it will be always,” she replies.

Chadhha has also worked with The Big Telly Theatre Company in Northern Ireland. She says the theatre scene is different abroad — be it in the way it is performed or perceived, as well as in the regularity of shows. “In India, theatre is still a marginalised art form. It is something most people do in their spare time. In theatre-rich countries, the audiences are huge too. But I have seen Marathi and Gujarati theatre run houseful for days here.”

Chadda will soon be seen in the films Tina Ki Chaabi, Zokkomon and West Is West, a sequel to East Is East in which she plays Om Puri’s daughter. But ask Sheeba Chaddha about them and she responds with laughter: “I’m not really a part of Bollywood. It is just something that happened on the side.” It is evident that nothing excites her as much as theatre. “It is more about the play than the characters,” she says on playing Hedda, “I guess that is what attracted me to Hedda too. Yes, the character is strong. But the role means nothing if it weren’t for the play itself.”

For Chadda, a life dedicated to theatre did not come easily: “It meant saying ‘No’ to a lot of things, including family, and this will never change for me.”