He’s best known to most of the world as ‘Nana Padhnavis’ of the epoch-making legendary play “Ghashiram Kotwal”. In the offbeat film circuit, he’s popular as a pet protégé of the legendary Satyajit Ray.
Foreign audiences acknowledge his astute performance in films like “Seducing Maarya” and “Mississipi Masala”. For children, he’s a household name as the pioneer of the Grips Theatre Movement in India. The global medical world recognises him as a competent psychiatrist and visionary thought leader. Today’s Marathi theatre-goers admire him as ‘Inspector Bapat’ of “Katkon Trikon”… And to the populace bred on the peppery diet of Hindi movies, he may simply be known by any of his seemingly inconsequential but effectively portrayed characters…whether the comic villain ‘Kooka’ of “Trimurti”, the considerate police commissioner of “Ab Tak Chappan” or Ajay Devgan’s dad in “Apaharan”.
Whatever you call him and whoever you are - ardent fan, contemptuous critic or pushy aspirant - he doesn’t mind your intrusion. More important, he carefully weighs the conviction of your cause only after he’s religiously allowed you the freedom to speak your mind. In the process, he’s ready to brave the perils embedded in such congeniality of communication. This unconditional accessibility, a diminishing trait especially in those well-known, is one of his defining features.
Padmashree Dr. Mohan Agashe is an actor, activist, analyst, doctor… all of these and much more… finds Sudhir Raikar in this exclusive conversation with the gifted thespian on his fascinating insights thriving on the cusp of psychiatry and performing arts.
On his hospital ward as an Acting school
Psychiatric outpatients are naturally well versed in the language of theatre. Your challenge is to win the patient’s trust and confidence and yet not succumb to his version of the world around him. In my ward, I am a student of theatre. I learnt about the character of Othello, not in theatre, but from the ‘Othello Syndrome’ patients in the psychiatry ward.
NO patient walks in as a body alone…The clinic is the patient’s stage where he’s the script writer, director and performer - all rolled into one. As a doctor, you have to ‘choose’ which role to play to interact with the patient’s “character” …thereby entering his world, not forcing him into yours. This role play is spontaneous - whether to become aggressive, submissive, father-like, child-like...sometimes even to buy as little as a minute of his confidence and co-operation before a sedative can be injected to extinguish a panic attack. My theatre experience has undoubtedly helped me choose and enact such roles on the spur.
Doctors learn SOLELY through experience that the psychological treatment plays an equal, if not greater, role in the patient’s curative and palliative progress. Since the medical curriculum is not designed to address the need for the patient’s psychological management, practitioners tend to suppress their emotions in the focal attention to the scientific treatment. This is a cardinal error.
On Psychiatric truths
The general notion in public minds is that a psychiatrist treats’ mad’ people. Now, the ‘mad’ people you often see on the road, spreading their pent-up energy hurling stones or mouthing abuses to no one in particular…they hardly need a doctor because they’ve already found a solution to their problems, losing them to their make-believe worlds shrugging all public disdain with near-spiritual bliss.
Secondly, we have bundled umpteen psychological disorders in one word - Mad. As if madness was one single disease calling for a certain prescribed treatment. Most of the people with psychological disorders are neurotics travelling scot-free in the community, not the psychotics miserably trapped in clinics.
Talking of treatment, it’s invariably easier to treat those who have no pressures of survival. Treating psychotics is the bigger challenge. It’s pertinent to note that Sigmund Freud treated neurotics alone and he was highly selective at that. After all, his reputation was at stake and no wonder, his success rate was remarkably high and his recommendations became silver bullets.
It’s important to train doctors to distinguish between distress and disorder. The former does not have to turn into the latter to become eligible for treatment. Primary prevention is most important in psychiatry.
On the soul of Acting
Most actors with original ideas have problems with conventional acting schools. Schools give birth to rigid systems. They are intrinsically opposed to innovation and non-conformism. Precisely why talented artistes like Shombu Mitras and Bhakti Barves are invariably born outside the confines of such schools. And actors like Naseeruddin Shah, though products of acting schools, grew beyond the constraints in non-conformist fashion essentially because they are an institution within individuals.
Not that acting schools have no place. They maintain the consistency of the total performance, motivate the half-hearted to stay put and help minimise the learning curve of an aspirant. At best, acting schools bridge the gap between mediocre performers and outstanding performers. But beyond that, learning by instruction only produces a mechanical performance. An outstanding performance is a journey from within to without…it’s not in the head but in its surrender.
On Language & Learning
The language of words is a cerebral tool while the language of sound and images is an emotional tool. Hence a film appeals to us faster than a text book would. Cerebral behaviour is always monotonous - that you notice in lectures, rallies, seminars and symposiums. This behaviour is invariably cerebrally projected; hence the discourse becomes more of a drag. So, we need to balance the sensory and cerebral skills. There's no formal education that ensures this learning. We need to learn audio-visual communication as a subject and we need to learn it in a non-linear way unlike instructional learning.
For such learning to bloom, interest and intellect have to necessarily travel together. Not only does this voyage need to be timed well, it has to be amicably stretched to such point where transient fascination makes way for transcendental learning. The challenge is in building a conducive green house to grow this plantation.
On the commonality between Psychiatry & Performing Art
Both disciplines deal with emotions. For me, these are not two parts but one. Thanks to my acting voyage, I was able to develop a functional approach to life in sharp contrast to the structural model of physicality that pervades the whole of medicine.
Life is a game that begins with the basic functions of respiration and circulation, proceeds ahead as we continue to acquire new, finer functions only to fade away towards the end, leaving us yet again with the two basic functions that now are closer to a full stop. The dying character of ‘Bhau’ in the Marathi play “Mahanirvaan” or the nonchalant, matter of fact ‘Godbole’ in David’s Lean’s film “Passage to India” ..These are the folks who made this revelation to me…not any medical journal or text book of psychiatry.
Life’s a series of independent, irrelevant things. The onus is on us to find and attach a meaning to it. That’s the fun of it. In the whole hue and cry over the two vital functions, our medical students are not taught about the third equally vital function - Emotion. You are as dead without it though you may be physically alive for the world. The case for euthanasia stems from this reality.