'He will make an excellent Karna!'

From the glitz and glare of the tinsel world, Malayalam superstar Mohanlal is coming to the stage for the first time next week, to don the mythical role of Karna in a Sanskrit play.

The three-time National Award winner for the best actor is the protagonist of the play, Karnabharam, by Bhasa, which is being readied to be presented on stage by veteran dramatist and stage director Kavalam Narayana Panicker and his Sopanam troupe.

Thrilled at the prospect of adding a new dimension to his acting career, Mohanlal is eagerly looking forward to March 27, when the play is to be staged at New Delhi as part of the National School of Drama festival.

Mohanlal had an intense period of rehearsal at Sopanam, where he learnt his dialogues by heart with the help of a recorded cassette made available to him by Kavalam.

According to Kavalam, the play would depict the inner turmoil of Karna during the Kurukshetra war as depicted in the epic, Mahabharata. It would be entirely up to Mohanlal to bring out the two conflicting emotions which besiege Karna at the dawn of the fateful day: the thought of his mother Kunti's plea not not to kill his brothers, the Pandavas, and the thrill of the warrior on the battlefield.

"My first reaction when Mr Panicker offered me the role was Aiyyo! (Oh my God). But with his reassuring words, I decided to take up the challenge," Mohanlal says.

He then picked up the dialogues and learnt the nuances of Sanskrit pronunciation while shooting. He also spent days and nights at the rehearsal camp.

Mohanlal says it is an entirely different experience to deliver the Sanskrit dialogue and understanding it. He feels it has taken him to a "new level of existence."

Always ready to experiment, he had taken lessons in Kathakali for a role in the film, Vaanaprastham for which he won the National Award. Incidentally, the character portrayed by him as the Kathakali artiste was Arjuna, the rival to his present engagement, Karna.

Kavalam rates Mohanlal as one who possesses a combination of both inborn and acquired talent. "He has had a brush with Kathakali and Kalaripayattu, which will stand him in good stead for his present assignment."

"In fact, his body formations are good; he is demanding to do (kalari poses) more than what we actually expected him to do. He has already learnt all the dialogues which I sent to him in a cassette. He will make an excellent Karna," the director vows.

"Like a duck taking to water, he has imbibed the complex movements that characterise my theatre," Kavalam says.

Mohanlal plans to capture the play on video and this would later be sub-titled and telecast. He intends to use the proceeds from this film to set up an academy for performing arts in the State.

"The day has come," yells Karna in the play. So it has for Mohanlal.

UNI