Padmini-Tejaswini-Talat Aziz bring ghazal legend Begum Akhtar’s life to stage in Ammi Akhtari
Padmini-Tejaswini-Talat Aziz bring ghazal legend Begum Akhtar’s life to stage in Ammi Akhtari
Padmini Kolhapure and her family’s rich musical legacy is a well known fact in theatre and Bollywood.The actress, who herself occasionally dabbles in music is now bringing another legendary artist’s life to the stage.
Ammi Akhtari is a play on the life of ghazal legend Begum Akhtar. The Saif Hyder Hasan’s directorial has Padmini playing Begum Akhtar, while her sister Tejaswini Kolhapure plays her shagird.
Ghazal maestro Talat Aziz will be singing Akhtar’s ghazals live on stage. The play is being staged on October 25 and 27 in Mumbai.
Talking over the challenges of playing the legendary artist on stage, Padmini said, “Our director and producer Saif ji approached her with the script and said she has this beautiful script, and want her to play Begum Akhtar. While she almost ran away, but he said, read the script, and really want her to be part of this. She was even more nervous after reading the script, especially because the dialogues are in Urdu.
This is for the first time Padmini and sister Tejaswini are collaborating on a project. Earlier, she has worked with Saif in a film titled Yes Papa, hence, that’s when they approached her for this play. Padmini needed a little more prodding and coaxing because she wasn’t sure and she is also busy with other things.
Infact, It was Tejaswini’s idea to get Talat Aziz on board to sing Begum Akhtar’s ghazals live on stage instead of approaching a female singer. And when it comes to ghazals, it doesn’t matter whether the singer is male or female as there is a depth to it, gravitas. One doesn’t need that maturity to sing and express.
As per Talat, Begum Akhtar had her own inimitable style of singing and none can replicate that. But you can try and absorb her temperament of singing. She has sung her songs as part of his concerts all over the world. The challenge here was to sing these as part of a play at crucial moments which were being enacted by these two actors.
Padmini went on to add that this is something unique and out of the box, bringing the play and ghazals both together. It’s her thinking that something like this is being done for the first time.
News Edit KV Raman
