History of India - VIRitten

The whole of the last weekend, I was attending a wedding, a family function and meeting too many people (especially the family types) for my comfort and tolerance levels. So, I just wanted to spend last evening alone in my room, moping about nothing. I cancelled my plans with Moon and decided I'll go home and try to concoct a cake without an oven or a cooker for my parents' anniversary today. But the thought of going home wasn't really appealing either. So, THEN I decided to go watch a film. Alone but not really alone coz there'll be people around me, you know? And while leafing through the newspapers to find a good Shor in the City or Stanley ka Dabba show, I saw that Vir Das's History of India stand-up comedy show was playing at St. Andrews in Bandra. I knew it'd be a major drain on my pocket but what the hell, I wanted to watch it and be on my own and not mope. And it turned out to be one of the best decisions I've ever made! :)

Artists: Kavi Shastri and Vir Das 
Written by: Vir Das
Ashvin Gidwani's Productions
Rating: 5/5

Vir Das is simply hilarious. He has written a brilliant script incorporating various important events from the history of India with exactly the right kind of humour inserted at exactly the right moments. Ummm, well, at least humour inserted at exactly the right moments. :P About the right kind of humour, depends on how you see it. Vir Das just screws everyone up. He comments on anything and everything under the sun and more often than not, his comments are quite rude. They are true. And he plays on stereotypes, like most comedians do. But he doesn't spare a thought to being politically correct. So, if you are touchy or sensitive about anything, maybe it's not for you. But if you are willing to take everything in the right spirit, you're going to love this piece!

 The act is obviously proud of India and I'm sure Vir Das is too. Either that or he is a damn good writer and actor. It (The act, I mean) is proud of everything that India was, is and is capable of being. But even so, it is completely unapologetic about it's satirical punches and about hitting below the belt. I felt it was quite cathartic to sit there and recognize the problems but find them funny as well. Makes them seem a lot smaller than they are/ seem to be otherwise. :)

I would most definitely recommend everyone to watch this one! :D It's a great way to spend your time. Plus, it's always a bonus when they scrub themselves up well. ;) One advice though: Remain inconspicuous. Don't turn up late or munch anything loudly. Or move for that matter. :P







* Pictures courtesy Google Images

The Vagina Monologues

Produced and directed by: Mahabanoo Modi-Kotwal and Kaizaad Kotwaal
Cast: Mahabanoo Modi-Kotwal, Dolly Thakore, Jayati Bhatia, Avantika Akrekar and Sonali Sachdev
Rating: 6/5

The moment Mahabnoo Modi-Kotwal made all the men in the audience stand up and applauded them for being there instead of the IPL match at the Wankhede stadium, I knew I was going to love the next 70 minutes or so. She just had a way of saying things, even things as simple as "Please switch off your mobile phones", that you wanted to laugh with her if she laughed, cry with her if she cried and rage with her if she vented.

Actually, the evening had begun on a not-at-all promising note. Moon, two of my cousins and I went to the Comedy Store in High Street Phoenix Mall, Lower Parel here in Mumbai for the show. The Club was super expensive, had bad lounge lighting, loud horrible music and obviously bad management. We were waiting outside the club for about 30 minutes and then, inside the club for more than 30 minutes before the show began. So naturally, we were quite pissed off. (Incidently, if anyone wants to know my ratings for the club, it would be 2.5/5.)

But the show more than made up for it. It was a complete laugh riot, which had still maintained it's sensitivity. Exploring all the possible avenues of womanhood through the vagina, the show narrated so many individual stories and stories of half the population of the world - some heart-warming, some heart-rending, some touching, some empowering, some brutal, some pleasurable...the list goes on. The monologues explore sexual pleasure, orgasms, conditioning, repression, rape, child sexual abuse, periods, child-birth and even a Vagina workshop to teach women how to love and respect your vagina. These were the stories of a Parsi woman who had repressed herself for decades and decades, a Maharashtrian woman who "had had some experience. With men.", a Punjabi woman whose husband had a shaven pussy fetish, European women who were raped during the World Wars, making innocent victims of them, a girl from Louisiana who faced sexual abuse when she was 10, women who attended the Vagina workshop conducted by a woman, a woman who had a moan fetish and who had changed her preferences, of genital mutilation etc. Every single one of the Monologue was given such consideration and was delivered perfectly. The play has managed to capture the essence of what it feels like to be a woman, to have that anatomical place "talking about which is considered as bad manners today".

Jayati Bhatia, (extreme right) in her role of the woman with the moan fetish drew the maximum amount of applause. Even Avanti Akrekar (extreme left) with her ability to modulate voice according to operatic necessities and Sonali Sachdev (in the front) with her strong acting and accent modulation skills stole everyone's hearts.


All in all, it was awesomeosome!! I loved the play to bits and would definitely recommend anyone if they get a chance to watch it. :)

*Images courtesy Google Images.

Draupadi

I watched the play Draupadi directed by Tina Johnson and Shivani Pasrich at NCPA on Sunday. I must say, after all that I had heard about her, I did not expect something so mediocre from Tina Johnson.

Rating: 2.5/5

Draupadi, for those who are not familiar with the Hindu mythology, is the wife of the five Pandavas from the epic, Mahabharata. The Kauravas (the evil cousins of the Pandavas) challenged Yudhistir, the eldest Pandava, to a game of dice. Yudhistir lost everything he owned to the Kauravas including his brothers and finally their wife, Draupadi. She was humiliated in front of a whole court full of elders. Lord Krishna came to her rescue and even when Duryodhana, the eldest Kaurava, was pulling her sari, it never ended. Finally, he gave up and she couldn't be completely de-robed. The Pandavas were then sent into exile for 13 years. However, Draupadi, it is said, sought revenge for her humiliation for all of those 13 years. And when they returned, this episode was used as an excuse for the battle of Kurukshetra between the two sets of cousins.

The play Draupadi, is about a modern day woman, Maaya (Chaaru Shankar), who faces the same challenges as Draupadi did in her times. Having faced severe humiliation at the hands of her own family, she has to make a choice - whether she wants revenge or should she forgive? Draupadi (Shivani Pasrich) is still on the earth, her soul, having been denied from the heaven because of her pride and vanity. She sees Maaya trying to commit suicide and stops her. She offers to give Maaya advice if she would perform a special pooja for the redemption of Draupadi's soul. Maaya ignores Draupadi and seeks revenge. Finally, they both realise that revenge brings no change and nothing can take away the pain of humiliation. It's best to forgive and forget. It is only through forgiveness that you can get redemption.

Thus the premise of the play is that you must forgive and forget. However, the reason the play did not work for me was because they forget what they are asking to forgive. How can a woman think of forgiving one of the most humiliating, most invasive and most painful act committed by a man against her? Something that makes the woman feel impure for no fault of hers? Thus, the very premise of the play is based on shaky grounds.

As far as the performances go, Dilip Shankar is excellent in his role as Krishna. He manages to capture the world-wiseness as well as the mischief of Krishna's character brilliantly. Unfortunately, none of the other characters are as well-portrayed. Kaurava (Sanjit Bedi) is not evil enough, Arjun (Arjun Fauzdar) is not man enough, Maaya is not distressed enough and Draupadi is just plain annoying in her look-at-me-I've-suffered-for-so-long-and-only-now-do-I-realise-forgiveness-is-the-key comments. I think the whole point of Draupadi's character was so that she can show off Ritu Kumar designed beautiful dresses. The only point where I liked her was when there was a mini dance sequence during Arjun and Maaya's wedding. It was beautifully choreographed by Aniruddha Das and very well-executed as well.














There were a few good moments in the play. For every scripture-spat dialogue, there was a genuinely nice and thought provoking dialogue and Dilip Shankar provided some much needed, intelligent comic respite. Do watch if these kind of things interest you and you have absolutely nothing to do instead. But, don't expect ingenious stuff. Feminism and mythology finally seems to be overdone now.


*Pictures courtesey: http://www.draupadi.in/photographs_staging_play.htm

When you watch THE worst play ever, you torture your blog-readers with its details

I watched the world's worst play EVER yesterday. A Gujarati play called "Ek Aham ni Rani" (An Arrogant Queen.) I often watch Gujarati plays with my family on Sundays. Gujarati theatre is a very good place to be, actually. It's doing really great, with good actors, directors and ideas generally. But, then, once in a while, you get such shit, you want to stop watching Gujarati theatre altogether!

Anyway, Ek Aham ni Rani is directed by Latesh Shah and the lead character is a very famous Gujarati actress, Sujata Mehta. Yesterday was actually it's premier show. Now,  Latesh Shah is actually this person who has built a whole company based on various spiritual things. He has taken teachings and precepts from all sorts of things, like Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, Osho, Yoga, Meditation, Hindu philosophy, Jainism etc and built his own "positive thinking" and "power of love" kind of spiritual khichdi. And this play can be best described as an advertisement of his stuff. Yea, I know!!

Ok, I need bullet marks from here onwards.

• The show was supposed to start at 8:30 pm and started at 9:45 pm. The excuse: Obama and traffic in the city. Answer: organisation and good planning.
• Since they were late, they tried to do things quickly coz the hall has to be emptied by midnight. And, they said dialogues so fast that I could only understand half of them.
• Also, since they were running late, they left a few loose ends without tying them up and I don't think they were supposed to be left that way.
• There was one dialogue in there, for which I hate the play with all my heart and soul: "Of course a woman should aim high and fulfil all her aspirations. But she should never forget that she is also a house wife. The home and all its relationships have to be held together by the woman of the house." If thoughts could kill, the dialogue writer and the director would have been dead about 138 times by now. 
• Latesh Shah probably tried to experiment with the character of Sutradhar (narrator) but it was one of the worst sutradhars I've ever seen. He himself played that character and kept saying things like, "If you think positive, everything positive will happen. You can't decide in your head what is going to happen. You have to take that risk." or "You should praise people. You know, if you praise people, they will be pleased and they will work harder for you. Show appreciation and you will lead a peaceful life, both at work and at home." Thank you very much, Mr. Shah but if I wanted to know this kind of stuff, I'll go and buy a Robin Sharma type self-help book. When I come to watch a play, I want entertainment. 
• There is a teenage daughter, who started "drinking, smoking, doing drugs and finally, tried to commit suicide" to escape the realities at home because her mother was so busy with all the work, she could never give her any time. May I point out that the father was a real estate broker who used to work from home? Is he not equally guilty of the girl feeling the need to resort to intoxication because the atmosphere at home is so volatile? 
• The acting was mediocre at best. The lead character often messed up the pronunciation of words while trying to say things. And the English of the characters! "Make sure that both of them doesn't get away with cheating on my company." "What a confidence!" 

I will stop now. I don't want to think about it more and give myself a headache. Or lose my readers. I hate self-help books and I would have gladly read one instead of watching this play. That, I think, speaks volumes about it. If this play ever comes to your city or if you ever think of watching it, be warned, it's going to make you want to throw up. I want my ruined Sunday and my money's worth back. hmph.