Report -Masquerades 2016

Submitted by: Anoushka Manidhar and Sanket Chakraborty

Selection of the Event Manager :

The selection process of the event managers for Masquerades 2016 was done based on a letter written by the students stating why they should be considered for the position and why they thought they were capable enough to be selected as the event managers. The names of the 2 event managers were later announced in the class and it came as a surprise to both. They were overjoyed to have been presented with such responsibility in the very first week of joining the college and they had set a goal to make the event a success.

Ideas and goals :

 The very first goal for the event was to make it a success. The event managers wished to present Masquerade 2016 as it had never been presented before. The initial concern was to make sure that proper publicity was done for the event as proper audience was a key element for any successful event. Then, they had to make sure that the venue was available for the span of the entire event and that everything was accessible to the groups so that they could perform with no difficulties. After that, they had to make sure that all the groups were practicing properly and all their actions were taken in a proper way.

How practices went :

Each group decided places throughout the campus for practicing their play. While some groups began practicing very early, some groups took a lot of time in editing their scripts. Each groups practiced for about one to two hours daily, in the presence of their directors helping them throughout and guiding them. Some groups faced difficulties because few members left college and their roles had to be shifted. There were also some minor internal conflicts within some groups but at the end everyone managed to overcome those differences and presented a good show.

Flaws :

• Publicity :-

The publicity team delayed with putting up the posters. So, despite putting up posters throughout the campus, they were not able to gather a big audience and because of this they could not match up to the standards of publicity that they had set.

• Mismanagement on the first day :-

On the first day, the event clashed with the inauguration of Darpan. Because of this the control room in-charge did not reach the mini-auditorium on time and so the event got delayed by a few minutes as they could set up the mikes only after he had arrived.

Summary of each play :

Group 1:

Name of the play – The Play of Adam and Eve

Date of Play–July 6^th, 2016

Director – Rushith Adhikari

Assistant Director–Simran Gagnani

After creating the world, God made a beautiful garden called the Garden of Eden. He also made two beings by the name of Adam and Eve. The play narrates the story of these two beings who did not obey God’s warning of not eating fruits from the Tree Of Knowledge and did just the opposite. Angered by this act of disobedience, God punished them to abandon the Garden of Eden and go reside on the Earth. And that’s how the mankind started and came into existence.

The play was beautifully presented by the group members and their efforts were quite visible. However no show comes without its difficulties and this too had some. Three of the members of this group left college in between the rehearsals. Also, the date of their play also remained undecided as the week of the event had one day holiday for Ramzan coinciding which made matters a little indecisive. Despite of all odds,his group managed to put up a good play.

Group 2:

Name of the play – Harrowing Of The Hell

Date of Play – July 7^th, 2016

Director – Adithya Satish

Assistant Director – Michelle John

After crucifixion, Jesus goes to hell to bring back the innocent and pious men from the clutches of Satan. The play was about Jesus saving Adam and Eve, King David, John, Holy Moses, and Abraham from the pain and torture of hell. It was about how Jesus and Satan competing on who gets to keep them. Satan believes that because of the apple that he gave to Adam, he and his entire race belongs to him, whereas Jesus Christ pities humans exceedingly and resolves to bring the human and lead them to paradise.

The task of making a team out of the group of 14 individuals was the biggest challenges that this group faced. The other challenge was to invite the audience too their play as all the publicity was done keeping in mind that the play would be on July 7^th. But the team did stand strong even in the most challenging times and when the whole play was falling apart.

This was the play which surprised all of us. This group which had not practiced well a day before their performance managed to grab the trophy of Masquerades 2016 and won the event! They showed the maximum amount of improvement in their performance and managed to outshine all the other groups. The props they used and their costumes were exceptionally well planned and so was their stage design. In our opinion they truly deserved to be the winners of the event.

Group 3:

Name of the Play – Play of the Weather

Date of the Play – July 5^th, 2016

Director – Odyssey Gohain

Assistant Director – Elizabeth Scaria

Jupiter decides to solve the problem of which is the most suitable weather among the earthly citizens. Each citizen brings forth his or her favourite weather and argues that it should be maintained all the yearlong. After hearing everyone’s opinions, Jupiter decides and comes to the conclusion that all the weathers would have a chance to come once a year and that the original setting and arrangement of the weathers was the best option.

The group definitely managed to present the play beautifully. With actors like Elizabeth and Reuel as a part of their group, their performance was very well presented. The actors did the best of their jobs and so did the costume designers. The play was overall very well but also did have a few flaws here and there as some actors forgot their lines in between the scenes. The extra-curricular activities posed some difficulties as there were slight possibilities for all the group members to meet together and practice. Also the auditorium was not available to us for an entire practice of the play on the stage with lights and sound due to various errors.-00There was also frequent miscommunication between the auditorium attendant and the director which caused a few errors in lighting.

Group 4:

Name of the Play – Raising of the Lazarus

Date of the Play – July 4^th, 2016

Director – Alok Emannuel

Assistant Director – Varun Dinesh

The Raising of the Lazarus is a narrative which exemplifies the power of Jesus a prominent sub in the Gospel of John. This was a miracle play presented by the group. It explains how Jesus used his unbelievable power to awaken the dead and bring them to life.

Their play was the first to be staged in the week of the event. Keeping in mind the fact that they performed first, they did well. Their confidence was commendable and they worked really hard to bring out the best that they could. Although their actors did forget some lines and dialogues, it was not very apparent.The audience fortunately wasn’t able to make out the few flaws here and there and hence managed to put up a good show.

Group 5:

Name of the Play – Wisdom

Date of the Play – July 8^th, 2016

Director – Vaibhava Ram

Assistant Director – Raisa Ghosh

Anima (the soul) declares her love for Wisdom, declares her love for Wisdom, the allegorical figure for Christ. Wisdom advices Anima and her three faculties (Will, Mind and Understanding) about how to live virtuously. In the second part Lucifer tempts each of the three faculties – Will with lechery, Mind with pride and Understanding with perjury. In the third and the final part, Wisdom returns to chastise the three faculties for falling into temptation.

The group did manage to perform very well but also did face some difficulties. The first and the foremost being that they had to translate 1200 lines from Middle English to Modern English. Since their script was so long they also had to learn and memorize a lot of dialogues which was proving to be very difficult for all the actors especially the major protagonists. Anyhow, the group did perform well in the end and came out as a very well presented play.

Suggestion for future Masquerades :

• Students organizing Masquerades in future must ensure that they do a good amount of publicity from the very beginning.
• The venue in-charge should be informed regarding the entire event beforehand.
• Lack of communication with the groups and authorities should be avoided.
• They must walk up to their seniors and should not hesitate to ask them for suggestions as they are the best mentors.

In the end, we are immensely grateful to Sir Joseph Edward Felix, Assistant Professor, Department of English, CHRIST (Deemed to be University), Bengaluru, for giving us the opportunity to be Event Managers of Masquerades 2016 as we were able to gather a lot of practical experience and learn a lot from it. We also thank our seniors for helping us whenever we required their help, and finally our classmates, without whom we would not be able to put up Masquerades 2016 successfully.