KARACHI: The National Academy of Performing Arts (Napa) will stage Indian playwright Swadesh Deepak’s celebrated play Court Martial from Oct 9 at the academy’s in-house theatre, announced artistic director of the Napa Repertory Theatre Zain Ahmed at a press conference here on Friday evening.

Mr Ahmed said the play, directed by Napa graduate Sunil Shankar, was a gripping courtroom drama. He termed Shankar’s style of working as ‘experimental’, because the young director liked to deconstruct things, which was why even the set of the play was quite interesting.

After the opening day, Court Martial will run from Thursday to Sunday till Oct 20, while Oct 8 was media night.

Mr Shankar then informed the media on the subject of Court Martial. He said everything was ‘defined’ in the play. It basically touched on the issue of the caste and class system that existed in society. He said he had not kept things ‘realistic’ and turned them a bit abstract.

The cast of the play included Napa graduates Adnan Jaffer, Ali Rizvi, Fawad Khan, Owais Mangalwalla and Meesam Naqvi.

Mr Ahmed said he’d also like to talk about one of Napa’s ongoing projects, Ali Baba Chalees Chor, a play for children. Written by Shoaib Hashmi, it’s being staged every Sunday and weekdays were for schools — they can book the show. He said the response to the play had been encouraging which meant that there was need for entertainment for our children.

Uzma Sabin, the director of Ali Baba Chalees Chor, said the play had all the ‘energy’ that’s required for a children’s drama. She said Arshad Mahmud was requested to compose music for the project and he obliged.

Mr Ahmed said Napa had requested a famous puppeteer, Farooq Qaiser, to come to the academy and train Napa’s students. Mr Qaiser would join in December, and it’s hoped that by February Napa would have its own puppet theatre.

The Napa Repertory Theatre artistic director also announced that from Oct 25, Napa would participate in a programme called Pursukoon Karachi — an initiative taken by the artists’ community in the country as its response to the violence-stricken situation in the city. While in November, Samuel Beckett’s play Waiting for Godot directed by Zia Mohyeddin would be staged. It’s the first play in the English language that Napa was going to do, he added.

Replying to a question, Mr Ahmed said the number of people coming to watch theatre was on the rise despite the uncertain political situation in Karachi. He said that record attendance was seen in the recently concluded play Begum Jaan. And 21 shows of Ali Baba Chalees Chor had already been booked, he added.