Content warning: sexual assault
To kick off Women’s History Month, on March 3, The Marsh Theater held a livestreamed conversation with Dipti Mehta about her play, “Honour: Confessions of a Mumbai Courtesan.” Mehta shared a few clips from the play performed pre-pandemic and discussed her approach to the storyline and characters as both the playwright and the solo performer. The conversation was a part of The Marsh’s Solo Arts Heal program, a series of weekly free conversations with special guests providing healing education and advocacy.
Zooming in from Mumbai, India, Mehta launched right into the play’s context and motivations. Living in Mumbai, she explained, she would occasionally take a specific bus route that would travel “from the richest to the poorest” neighborhoods in the city. This was how she was first exposed to Mumbai’s Red Light District, and was inspired to write a play about a 16-year-old girl whose mother is a prostitute and is teaching her to