InDepth

  A journey into the life and works of Viveka Olofsson [Continued from Part I] Have you a count of all your gigs? Seriously??!! Yes, every gig is well-documented. My daughter says the new generation cannot read my handwriting, it is so bad! I did over 100 gigs in some years, in 1990 for example. One is nervous before every performance; you have the energy going, people start flocking, you start your show and then you forget about everything else and just perform your act. When the act ends, only then you get back to your attentive state. People come and hug you; you feel happy. During the performance act – as a clown – you must make every small act believable. The best part is – it is a new experience every time. You never get into a routine! You should never! How do you keep yourself updated? Reading books, watching theaters, films, other performances? Oh yes, most definitely. I read a lot. I need to connect to what is going on around me. To understand different themes – som...

A journey into the life and works of Viveka Olofsson Friends, do you know what “Chance meeting” is? It can be some sort of a fun activity. We can pretend to be someone or something and then we meet another person by chance. It is for that other person to appreciate, enjoy, laugh, and play along with us. My interview with Viveka, a celebrated clown artist was some sort of a chance meeting for me. This I say because I knew little about the craft, art and process that go behind the making of a successful clown. I was just acting my way to get to understand all of that. All of that indeed – Viveka has been documenting every single gig in her diaries. From 1978 up until now! Why clown? I liked drama – the act of it. I wanted to learn drama as a discipline. The long journey started there. Then through different tracks I ended up being a clown artist. Any role-models? Any early influences? From the beginning I had a defined clown role. It was a well-directed role and I ran a roller-...

The day of shooting starts We started the day at 7, I still remember. It was drizzling and it was dark. Month of August and forecast was light showers all day.  Director friend Saikat had just come with the camera unit led by Ashish-da and they were checking different angles with light and sound. Surajit, the lead actor, playing the role of Abhi came shortly after and he was as much eager as we were. My first experience of a movie shooting! Excitement on one hand, I was more curious to know how everything will play out. I had read the screenplay written by the Director himself. But, it was hard for me to grasp the whole thing. Anyway, I was just the story-writer. I had written the "whats" and it is Saikat who was scripting all the "hows"! I looked at the old building, did I know it from earlier? It looked familiar. A little flash-back Finding this house had not been easy. Atin, Abhi, Hari and Ipsi - these were the 4 characters we had for the film. But that was not a...