Field of Butterflies Samanalayaya, the annual drama festival of Sunera Foundation was held last week at Lionel Wendt, showcasing incredible talents of young men and women the society has categorized as differently abled.
The Sunera Foundation has 37 workshops in Sri Lanka which are held weekly to engage differently abled youth in music, dance, drama and speech therapy. Samanalayaya drama festival is held provincially and the best performances are showcased at the final event held in Colombo.
Physical and mental disabilities aside, head-spins, head-stands, and other dances along with incredible singing and acting were some of the talents that were open for the audience to embrace, performed by a talented group who are most often not given an opportunity in the society.
Samanalayaya Drama Festival has also become a platform for the trainers of Sunera workshops to exhibit their talents in direction, production and script writing, the latter they have to pay special attention to as most often they use music to express ideas as there are participants with speech impairment taking part in the drama.
This year’s Samanalayaya covered a range of themes, there was fantasy, magic, poverty, labour rights, and bullying at schools, while the dance items covered songs from various genres. Trainers are the real heroes behind the productions who identify talents of each and every participant, and write scripts to include their talents. Every movement, in dramas or dances, were trained gradually during the workshops, and put together nicely in the final production. The themes carry messages to the audience, parents as well as the participants.
