With just a week to go before Oasis, the coordinator of the Mime club, Akarsh Chandra, took some time out of his busy schedule to speak to the Oasis English Press.

Mime Club organises three events during the inauguration ceremony of Oasis. Two-stage plays each of about ten minutes, as well as a special event, a spectacle where actors try to catch the attention of the audience using impressive visuals. To add to these events, there is also a semester-long video production, usually a short parody of popular movies, he explained. Nevertheless, this year genres other than comedy were being explored by the club, he stated. 

 Akarsh explained that the stage plays were intended as a humorous attempt to put familiar things in unfamiliar circumstances, while still being relatable. In contrast, the special act is an attempt to create a spectacle where impressive visuals attract the attention of the audience. Mime Club previously performed a ‘light balance act’, where actors appeared behind a screen as shadows to perform their act.

Apart from these events, Mime Club also organises three other events. These include Open Mic Night, Improv, and Pun Wars, for which Akarsh encouraged open participation from all.

When asked about the preparatory work that the club does before the fest, Akarsh explained that the preparation was divided into four parts. The first part was ideation, where club juniors came up with ideas for skits and plays as well as other events. The second part involved the creation of ‘funds’, or small funny sequences. The third part involved weaving those small bits into coherent scenes, and the fourth part involved the creation of full scenes and a well-flowing stage play.

When asked about his experience as a coordinator, Akarsh said that the stress was quite manageable because he was used to the work. ‘My work as a coordinator is similar to the work I was doing before informally, so I thought I might as well do it formally,’ he explained. Moreover, he added that good planning ensured that the work went smoothly and thus reduced the stress placed on the people responsible for it.

Akarsh then addressed the first and second-year students. ‘Explore your passions, because otherwise, parts of you that are unexplored may never come out. This time you have in college you will never get back’ he concluded.