Rabindranath Tagore’s dance opera “Tasher Desh” (“Land of Cards”) comes to the Kumble Theater at Long Island University on Nov. 12.
This Bangladesh Institute of Performing Arts production depicts a battle between bold new ideas and strict tradition. Choreographed by New York Foundation for the Arts’s 2015 Folk Arts Fellow Annie Ferdous, the drama develops through a narrative that combines traditional Bangladeshi dance and Tagore’s original songs with English dialogue.
The story is a satire of a society ruled by strict convention. A prince, tired of suffocating in his palace, goes in search of adventure. He is accompanied by a disciplined merchant, and the mismatched pair get shipwrecked in the Land of Cards, whose playing-card inhabitants are well regulated and devoid of emotion. With the wild force of his personality, the prince starts to influence the cards, and gradually their human qualities begin to emerge.
“Land of Cards,” Nov. 20 at 7 pm. Tickets are $12 for adults and $7 for students and children under 10.
Kumble Theater at Long Island University [1 University Plaza between Willoughby and DeKalb avenues in Fort Greene, (718) 488–1624; www.brook
