Jayatheertha


Jayathirtha is an Indian theater activist, social worker and filmmaker. He is a well known director and playwright in Indian theatre world and Kannada films. He is known for his movies Olave Mandara, Tony, Beautiful Manasugalu, and the most recent blockbuster Bell Bottom. He also stands out for his work as a director and playwright, as well as for acting in as many as 4,200 street plays, that were presented with social message regarding various issues.

Early Life

Jayathirtha was born and brought up in Bangalore, Karnataka. A high school dropout due to financial constraints, he started working as a salesman at 17 and took up theater as a past time. He trained at Abhinayataranga under the renowned theater personality A. S. Murthy and later started teaching there.
What started as a hobby became a passion. Jayathirtha won several awards for excellence in various aspects of theater – stage design, acting, direction, and script writing. He even won the prestigious B V Karanth Best Stage Reviewer Award for his critical review of the play, Maranayak.
He has written short stories. His short stories have won Second Best Small Story Award – Gulbarga University, First Place in Short Story Award – Belagali Sahithya Pratistana, First place in Short Story Award – Kannada Sahithya Parishath.

Film Career

Jayathirtha started to train actors for film industry and himself developed an interest in film direction too. His growing interest made him start studying World Cinema in depth. In 2007, he directed a short film called Hasivu which brought him recognition at international forum. The movie won Best Indian Short Film award at Cinerail Film Festival, Paris.
In 2011, he directed a full-fledged Kannada feature film, Olave Mandara which brought several awards including 59th Filmfare Award. The sub-plot of Olave Mandara is inspired by the real life events of Dashrath Manjhi who cut a rocky hill for 22 years to build a road in memory of his wife.
Later he directed Tony which won him Karnataka State Film Award for Best Screenplay. Tony is a philosophical film about a person who wants to make a quick money. Jayathirtha’s philosophical bend drew one of its subplots from Leo Tolstoy’s short story How Much Land Does a Man Need?
Bullet Basya was a Kannada comedy film and a commercial entertainer.
Beautiful Manasugalu is a story of two innocent lovers who fall prey to media manipulation, and the corrupt system that favors sensationalism over truthful reporting. The story takes an unconventional turn defined by their fight, struggle and the truth. This story is based on the true occurrences that shocked people in 2012.. The movie won Best Dialogues Award at KAFTA Times of India 2017, the only awards given to technicians in Kannada film industry.
Vanilla is a murder mystery with a message of social concern. The story is about Capnophobia, the fear of anything to do with smoke and smoking.
Bell Bottom is a comedy crime thriller, a story of a die-hard fan of detective stories. His ambition of becoming a famous detective is crushed by his constable father. Forced to join the police department, the unhappy detective's life spiced up by an intriguing case. The story is set in '80s which adds a period dimension to the story. The movie became one of the biggest films in 2019. It became the first Kannada film in 2019 to complete 100 days. It also won the second best commercial film recognition at Bangalore International Film Festival 2020. The movie has won Best Director Award in Critics Choice Film Awards 2020.
Jayathirtha has now started shooting for a movie called Banaras on the banks of river Ganga.

Theater Activities

Jayathirtha has conducted more than 150 theater training programs, focusing on issues including life skills. He penned and directed 65 street plays and ten stage plays from 1996 to 2007. He organized those plays to spread social awareness among illiterates and the backward classes. Jayathirtha directed Hathim Thi, an experiment with 500 actors, at the Al-ameen school building.
Jayathirtha has used street plays as effective medium to convey philosophical messages, concerning social issues, imbued with entertaining flow. His approach is to involve the audience into the flow of the plays. He scripted six stage plays and 69 street plays/shows, only on social issues.
His ‘Hebbala’ play is an unusual attempt at creating awareness. Produced by Madhyam Communications, in collaboration with a few other voluntary organizations such as K.S. Muddappa Memorial Trust, CATS, and DEED, the play is a unique experiment to create awareness amongst youngsters about proverbs through theater. Built entirely on proverbs, ‘Hebbala’ means a huge banyan tree. It symbolizes the rootedness of proverbs and its potential to include a wide range of human experiences. Written and directed by Jayatheertha, the play consists of three short folk tales woven together using the village singer and story-teller as the link.

Workshops

Jayatheertha has used his immense theater experience and understanding of human behaviors in conducting several workshops for dumb and deaf children, HIV/AIDS patients, teachers, counselors and psychologists. Much of his workshops involve theatrical enactments, story-telling, street plays, and the like.
Some important workshops held and directed by Jayathirtha with prominent organizations were about creating social awareness amongst certain sections of the society. A workshop for a mix of slum children with upper class children held at Chitrakala Parishat to create awareness about child right. A street theater project of Madhyam Intarnational, Vasanthnagar, which was directed by Jayathirtha was on the conservation of old monuments in Hampi. Equally unusual endeavor is a street theater workshop where ex-devadasis were exposed to the nightmares of child marriages.
He worked with more than seventy organization, including Sacred Heart College where he was a guest lecturer for mass communication students, Bangalore Agenda Task Force, Ogilvy & Mather, Global Alliance, Arvind Mills, Jindal Plant, Archeological Survey of India, Janapada Academy, Myrada Plan at Heggadadevana Kote, Education Development Center, Madhyam International with whom he directed numerous street plays, Accenture, and Novel.

Radio

Jayathirtha directed a 450-episode of educational radio drama for children, Chukki Chinna – Chinnara Chukki, for an NGO Education Development Center under Sarva Shikshana Abhiyana program of Govt. of India. This interactive syllabus-based radio program was recorded between 2005-2007, but it continues to play on radio for first standard to sixth standard students in Karnataka government schools.

Recognition

Awards