Image: supplied
Certain foods, and their preparation, are powerful stimulants of emotion and memory. In The Kitchen, an Australian exclusive for Sydney Festival, director Roysten Abel fuses the sights and smells of a couple preparing a traditional Indian dessert, Payasam, with the vigorous drumming of 12 men on copper mizhavu drums.
Set in the well-chosen York theatre (Seymour Centre), we enter the room to see the drummers seated, in the dark, on three levels of an impressive beehive shaped set. In front of them, the couple enter the room wordlessly and sit side by side at separate pots. The first row of drummers begin, rhythmically matching the slow, deliberate movements of the man and woman as each works methodically. Their movements are matched, but not completely symmetrical: as in any relationship, sometimes they are more in tune, sometimes not.
After a syrupy mixture is poured, they move to sensually adding flour, nuts and milk; sometimes stirring vigorously, sometimes sitting wordlessly as the smell of burning sugar wafts up into the audience. We imagine a disagreement as they pound at the copper pots with paddles, their movements matched by powerful drumming which reverberates through the chest. Then comes stillness, a resolution: the woman rests her head on her partner’s shoulder and they sit for several minutes.
Eventually, the Payasam is complete and all 12 musicians come together to create a beautiful finale. This perfectly evokes the exhaustion of the couple who rest on their knees as waiters enter to remove the desserts. Abel addresses the audience and invites the audience to taste the Payasam in the foyer after the show, where waiters clad in simple traditional garb serve it from the copper pots taken from the stage.
Admirers of the 13th century Persian poet Rumi won’t struggle to see how Abel could have been inspired to create The Kitchen by a visit to the mystic’s graveside. Abel’s lighting design is ingenious, as we see each drummer’s hands illuminated like flames, bouncing off the copper kettle-like drums as they pound them. Commendation should also go to Neeraj Sahay for the excellent set design. Coupled with the traditional costumes (Mandakini Goswami) and depth of emotion that the couple on stage display through the simple act of cooking, this is an enchanting piece. The cooks, played by Goswami and Dilip Shankar, are faultless. The Payasam itself, built up in the mind over the course of 75 minutes, is polarising, but the actual taste is really irrelevant.
Rumi tells us ‘When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you.’ The Kitchen oozes soul from every ounce of its copper drums and pots. This is a unique sensory experience.
Rating: 4.5 stars out of 5
The Kitchen
By Roysten Abel
York Theatre, Seymour Centre
Director: Roysten Abel
The Cooks: Mandakini Goswami, Dilip Shankar.
The Mizhav Players: Kalamandalam Rajeev, Kalamandalam Hari Haran, Kalamandalam Narayanan Nambiar, Kalamandalam Dhanaraj, Kalamandalam Ratheesh Bhas, Kalamandalam Ammannoor Ravikumar, Kalamandalam Vineesh, Kalamandalam Jayaraj, Kalamandalam Ezhikode Vineeth Namboodhiri, Kalamandalam Sajith Vijayan, Kalamandalam Manikandan, Kalamandalam Saji Kumar
22 – 25 January, 2015
