Shakespeare-Wallah

A film set in India. There is a theatre company. English; it tours India playing Shakespeare. The Buckingham family runs it. A mother, a father and their daughter Lizzie. She was born in India. She has never seen England. From there the film is a story of touring. They go from town to town. They play in schools. They play at a maharaja's palace. They play in a hall. The halls keep emptying. The reason is plain. In India after independence there is no interest left in English theatre and the cinema is growing. In one town the theatre has been turned into a picture house. There is a star as well. Manjula is the best-known actress in Indian cinema. Sanju is a rich young man. He meets Lizzie and is interested. He is also Manjula's lover. Manjula finds out. She comes to a performance. She sits in the middle of the hall and draws attention during the play. The audience looks at her; not at the stage. That scene states the film's idea on its own. What the narrative is interested in is not love but displacement: its idea is that an art form and the people who carry it no longer have a place there. The mother wants to go back to England. The father does not; he has done this all his life. Where Lizzie should go is unclear. India is her country and she has no future there. The ending is on a ship. The production is among the early work of the Merchant Ivory team. The screenplay is by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala. The company is not invented. Geoffrey and Laura Kendal really toured India for years with such a theatre troupe and play parts close to themselves. Felicity Kendal is their daughter and this is her first film. Satyajit Ray wrote the music. Madhur Jaffrey won the best actress award at Berlin. The images are black and white. James Ivory directed. Shashi Kapoor, Felicity Kendal, Geoffrey Kendal, Laura Liddell and Madhur Jaffrey are in the cast. Who it is for: anyone who likes post-independence India and quiet period film. Who it is not for: anyone expecting incident; the narrative is loose and almost nothing happens.