Motherhood not all warm and fuzzy: Bollywood actor's play spotlights messier side
The birth of a baby is celebrated as a moment of joy. But motherhood is not always warm and fuzzy. It can also be messy
The birth of a baby is celebrated as a moment of joy. But motherhood is not always warm and fuzzy. It can also be messy and untidy. That's what Bollywood actor Kalki Koechlin and well-known theatre director Sheena Khalid have tried to tackle in their new play Belly of the Beast. Adapted from Kalki's 2021 book, The Elephant in the Womb, which she wrote just months after giving birth, the play takes an unflinching look at motherhood and the myriad emotions mothers go through.
It tells stories of five women at different stages of motherhood - from pregnancy and labour to raising young children as the new mums come to terms with bodily changes, and struggle though sleepless nights while attempting to deal with work demands. Along the way, it also tackles darker aspects - abortions, miscarriages and postpartum depression. In India, where marriage and motherhood are regarded as the ultimate goal and a sacred duty for most women, a play talking about the discomforts of a mother comes as a refreshing change.
"Women are rarely allowed to express the dark feelings - the difficulties they face, the hormonal changes they go through, the loss of identity or postpartum depression," Kalki told the BBC. "The conversation in India is all about the gift of motherhood
and how beautiful motherhood is and how blessed we are to be mothers. But that life-giving process is so transformational that there is a certain part of you that's also grieving and losing identity, that's losing who you were before," she said.
The BriefWire