Theatre & Dance: Special Series; Mangai

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Dec 6, 1999

SPECIAL SERIES

Mangai, 39
Theatre Personality

GENDER BINDER
Sample this: "Art without activism has no value. Activism without art has no meaning." In her 15-year career as an actress, script writer and director, Mangai has lived it. Some say she leans so far left she could fall off the map. Others say: How many have left behind a conservative family and degrees in English literature for what she believes in; how many have received Fulbright fellowships to research theatre? Must be the talent.

Mangai has come to mean a statement on women, from plays in Tamil on custodial rape to Mounakkuram, which questioned the image of Draupadi, Sita, and norms of chastity, suffering and sacrifice. Mangai likes to call herself a "cultural activist". Feel like arguing?

-L.R. Jagadheesan

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