#FACON23!

The Fulbright Association Conference schedule is live! I’m honored to be jetting to Denver later this month to rep my alma mater NYU Tisch School of the Arts where I also teach part-time, and grateful to have received a Tisch Adjunct Professional Development Grant to attend. I’ll be giving a 60-minute talk entitled “Happy Accidents: How a Mistakenly Published Play Forced Reforms in British India”.

My abstract: In 1860s India, Bengali playwright Dinabandhu Mitra wrote the play Nil Darpan (Indigo Mirror), an exposé of violent abuses committed against malnourished Indian farm workers by powerful British indigo dealers. With help from a Christian missionary the play was translated into English and shared with the office of Bengal’s Lieutenant-Governor Sir John Peter Grant. Grant approved a few copies to be printed to share with colleagues; instead, hundreds were mistakenly printed and distributed to Parliament members in England, outraging and embarrassing the British Raj. But would the amusing debacle help bring positive change and food security to Indian laborers? These events are well-known but have often been mythologized and misrepresented. Stanley will provide his own findings from Indian, UK and US newspapers of the day.

Thank You, Mario!

Wow. Thank you so much, Drexel University, for the terrific article. The photos bring back a flood of memories, and I hope my tips are helpful to current Fulbright applicants.

Two stills from my scenes in the Hoichoi streaming series Manbhanjan directed by Abhijit Chowdhury, starring Anirban Bhattacharya and Sohini Sarkar.
Mario the Dragon, Drexel University’s mascot.

Jatra Shots – Tapashi Moon, et al

One of my final short jatra clips that I shot while in West Bengal as a Fulbright-Nehru Scholar in India in 2018-19.

They’re handheld and shaky, originally intended for my personal reference, but they might be of entertainment or educational value to others.

The producer is the Sri Chaitanya Opera jatra company is based in Kolkata, West Bengal, India. The play is a contemporary social drama called Sangsar Ek Khelaghor (Family Game Room) written by Babli Bhattacharya and directed by Ruma Dasgupta. Other than incidental mood music, all songs in this particular play are from popular Tollywood and Bollywood films of the previious 5-10 years. The location is rural Durgapur, West Bengal.

The rest are on my youtube channel on the “Jatra Shots” playlist.  Check ’em out!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObJtRm3PhqM&list=PLyFebM15FeUg9lTE16ItBdw3rA7lq2MGP