DRAMA REVIEW

Sunera Foundation - Samanalayaya

Ability hidden is DisAbility

by Isuri Yasasmin Kaviratne

The annual drama festival of Sunera Foundation was held on the 18th, mesmerising the audience with their talents, whether it’s acting, or dancing with backspins and headstands.

Sunera Foundation works with young men and women with disabilities, to help them uplift their living standards. It has over 30 workshops around Sri Lanka, including Jaffna, Matara, Puttalam and Batticaloa, having nearly 2,000 participants taking part in the weekly workshop to undergo various therapies; music therapy, art therapy, drama therapy and speech therapy.

Similar to the previous Samanalayaya, the participants wowed the audience with their performances, despite their disabilities, physical or mental. The participants who performed the dancing items made the audience forget that all the members of the dance squad are having either autism or Down Syndrome. Guided by their trainers, the participants took charge of the stage, proving that the general public is wrong to brand them, and stigmatise them.

Medical malpractices

The Samanalayaya does not try to hide the disabilities its participants are born with, or they got as a result of medical malpractices. The dramas are scripted to include as many participants as possible, with fewer dialogues to make it a comfortable process to many participants who are speech and hearing impaired.

Slapstick comedy and irony are common in the dramas to entertain the audience in the absence of dialogues and to entertain the participants performing the play who can understand actions better than words. The dramas, as well as the dances, were about acceptance, and acknowledging everyone’s contribution.

Inspiring

It was an inspiring moment of accepting and acknowledging their conditions and highlighting their talents, that were for so long for so many, remained hidden, without marginalising them.

It was a loud shout, that there is Ability hidden is DisAbility.