A new genre of theatre hits Sri Lanka this June promising devious plot twists and shocking events performed by a stellar cast. We sat down with director, Javin Thomas and executive producer, Jehan Bastians as well as one of the actors Neidra Williams to talk about their newest production – Blood Money.

Javin Thomas – Director

“I started theatre as early as 14 and acted in many inter-school shakes competitions, from primary all the way up school level. My acting was guided by Neidra Williams and I got involved in a lot of school plays and public stage performances since then. I’ve been directing school plays for almost 7 years out of which I was with Jehan and Neidra for 4 to 5 years.  Last year, I was also the assistant director for ‘The christmas carol’. I am currently directing my first production – ‘Blood Money’ with Jehan Bastian as the executive producer.

I wanted to do something different and that is why I chose a female dominated play. The story revolves around four strong characters portrayed excellently by Neidra Williams, Shanuki De Alwis, Andre Perera and Liza De Jong. The situation deals with an event that took place 7 years ago about a husband and wife.  The play is packed with sarcasm, intensity and most importantly, mystery throughout, promising a roller-coaster of thrills that would keep the audience guessing and tension mounting right up to the final curtain call!
Working with everyone has been great. We practice 3 days a week, but we will increase that closer to the show date.”

Jehan Bastians – Executive Producer

“I’ve worked with Javin since he was 14 and he has helped us with a lot of our work. ‘Silent Hands’ has been our main theatre company. We’ve done a lot of ‘farce’ comedy and we thought maybe we ought to look at something different. So we did ‘Sherlock Holmes’ where I directed, Javin produced and Neidra acted which was a different genre. We thought we should also get new people to direct and Javin was comfortable with the idea.

Blood Money is an amazing script. It contains emotions that a good actor can really get into. We have Shanuki and Neidra; two of the best female actresses in character for two of the strong female roles. The play is very intriguing and is humorous through the sarcasm it conveys.
A good play needs three things – Good script, good director and good actors. I think Blood Money has all three. This is a grounded story, not experimental theatre. There is enough comedy elements to it so we can call it “comedy thriller” which is a new genre in Sri Lanka. You can expect the usual slickness of Silent Hands production but coming from a new director.

Neidra Williams

“Silent Hands experimented last year with ‘Sherlock Holmes’ and we are very happy to continue this genre. I think we ought to try out other stories, moving away from comedy. Usually half the audience doesn’t turn up when something deep is played but we were amazed by the support we received for this production. It definitely strengthened our thoughts to continue.
Blood Money is very interesting; not the first I personally would have chosen. But having read the script I thought why not. Javin wanted strong female roles and this play definitely has that.”

Blood Money is presented with special arrangement with the Samuel French Inc and is a proud production by the ‘Silent Hands’ creative circle. Blood Money by The Heather Brothers is a comedy thriller directed by Javin Thomas and Jehan Bastians as executive producer. The show will go on boards on the 20th, 21st and 22nd of June 2014 at the Lionel Wendt theatre. Tickets are priced at Rs. 1500, Rs. 1000, Rs. 750 and Rs. 500 (Balcony) and are available along with the box plan at the Lionel Wendt.

By Hasna Saleem