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As the recent Chicago controversy shows, Indian theatre is insensitive to copyright issues, says Puja Goyal

"It's simple, the playwright is half a way around the world and people think no one will notice, and...
Chicago is only the tip of the iceberg."
Jagdish Raja, Theatre personality

Dated: Sunday Vijay Times, 03 September 2006, Centrestage

THE performance of the stage version of the musical Chicago, directed by Akshay Vijayan was stopped after three days by Lawyer Gopal Jain, on grounds of copyright infringement; this has come as a warning to all theatre directors in India. Investigations reveal that most producers neglect to take permission from the author before staging their plays. They pass it of as amateur and hope that the respective authority will not notice it. The producer also does not budget for the royalty of the writer and decides not to mention the name of the writer.

Ruchika Chanana, theatre person and documentary filmmaker says, "What I do not understand is why someone would not pay the playwright for their work... I know of producers who do not even acknowledge the name of the playwright. It's like publishing Da Vinci Code without Dan Brown."

Jagdish Raja, theatre person, says, "Whenever someone decides to stage a play, he needs to contact the agent, or the playwright and get an approval. With Internet publicity, authors and their authorised agents are informed of plays being performed anywhere in the world. Nowadays, there is growing tendency to evade the payment of royalties. Not paying royalties to the author is taking away from his or her income and is illegal. There are also instances where plays are being adapted, names and locations altered and other changes being made without referring to, and seeking the approval of the author or the authorised agent. There are also cases where plays are being modified and this modified version being passed off as an original play."

Samuel Beckett's estate is known to protect the rights and the manner in which his plays have to be performed. In 2005, Karen Hartman put a stop to the performance of her play Gum which was directed by Al Germani. Having heard of certain changes in her script, Hartman requested her friend Deborah Salzer to attend a preview performance. Salzer noted "substantial" alterations and informed Hartman who in turn along with Dramatists Play Service withdrew the rights to Gum. In his passion to realise a directorial vision, Germani deconstructed Hartman's play, overlooking her legal and artistic rights in the process. However, according to Germani, "it was only an attempt to "distill" and "abstract" the play's meaning by repeating words and phrases in incantatory fashion as choral speeches."

Chicago was stopped after three days of performance at Chowdiah Hall for non-payment of performance fees. The producers, Shyam Sundar and Krithika of Pulse Sports and Entertainment Management, allege that they had contacted Samuel French, the agents, in March and then in May, but Samuel French refused to respond; so they got in touch with the Indian Performing Rights Society, Chennai, who are stated (in their website) to be the only national copyright society in the country and paid them Rs 70,000 for the rights and proceeded.

Jagdish Raja, the authorised agent for Samuel French clarifies, "We are the agent for Samuel French, London, and we get occasional requests to treat plays from the US Company Samuel French Inc. We were unsure about Chicago's rights and asked Akshay to contact the Company and clarify directly. If you receive no response, it doesn't mean you can go ahead with the production. Be it charity, amateur, professional, commercial... the rule is, get permission. What I do not understand is how someone else can give out performance rights other than the agent or playwright? How can they pay the Indian Performing Rights Society... if they did, where is the receipt? There is something fishy here. I have sent a message to Performing Rights Society asking how they could issue a performing licence and am waiting a reply. Gopal Jain representing the Copyright holder(s) is being asked who exactly he represents: Samuel French or somebody else."

The real question is, why do producers refrain from paying the playwright? Jagdish Raja says, "It's simple, the playwright is half way around the world and people think no one will notice, and... Chicago is only the tip of the iceberg."