The festivals of all the five prominent temples in my hometown that come one after the other without much of a gap are reserved for hanging out, meeting friends and it’s nothing short of a grand year-end celebration.

But over the years, something has got diluted and the overall charm of these festivals is gradually decreasing. Other than decorated elephants and chenda melams, there are ganamelas, mimicry troupes, and classical dance and music.

The mass addiction of reality shows in recent years has stripped the charm of these religious festivals. Slowly but surely the number of people who thronged vast temple grounds decreased. The excitement for an approaching festival is not as strong as it used to be.

It’s all in the game of growing media influence and strange powerful pull that it generates. The present mega events in Kerala are the various film award functions conducted with organising costs running into lakhs.

Rewind to an old time and I bet all these stage shows put together can never beat the ‘rush of blood’ of a drama called Raktharakshas which was a tale about a female who turned into a sort of vampire seeking revenge.

The peculiarity of this drama was that it functioned like a film theatre with visual brilliance that was well ahead of its time. These shows ran to packed houses all over the State. The sound effects were brilliant and the outcome of the volume was selectively positioned through different speakers, just like the present surround sound system!

The ‘Scare element’ was really high as the acting and timing of the movements happening inside the really big stage was excellent. Supplemented with precise light control techniques, the whole show became really enthralling.

I remember a car and even a plane coming to the stage. How this was done with so much
perfection so many years back with primitive technology is something that still puzzles me.

The writer is a drummer with Kochi-based band Kaav