Somewhere in Space

So some silly newspaper focused on her cleavage. And she retorted like a wounded Lioness. A sexist response was of course that of a whole generation asking if she wasn’t making a mountain out of a molehill. But another generation is up in arms and asking the lady and many like her why they wear clothes designed to flaunt their cleavages (deep or otherwise) if the intention was not to show off what they’ve inherently realised is a perceived asset.

While I, as someone mentioned in a blog, am a normal male who will instinctively glance at a leg, or a waist or yes, even the odd cleavage or two, I don’t make a big thing of it and listen more to the mind and the heart…I know that there are some of my fellow men who may glance just that little longer and perhaps fantasise that much more.

But the sudden outrage caught me by surprise. And I wondered…so all the actresses who get make up done on their chest so as to show a deeper cleavage than they actually have is a figment of my imagination? so all the girls who wear bras that have some engineering advantages need to be pulled up…or pushed up as the case may be.

I remember an old joke from the 60s or 70s I think…where a young woman objected to a young man looking at her Airplane shaped locket that was hanging enticingly around her cleavage. And the man retorted that he was not looking at the aircraft but admiring instead…the landing field.

For Chrissakes, people were laughing about cleavages then…now what’s happened? Have they stopped being the joke? Has modesty suddenly been revived?

Talking of modesty…think of the men! For years after they became civilized and started wearing shirts, they were buttoned up to the neck. A bare chest was but a swimming pool delicacy or a labourer’s woe. Only in some exceptional cases some of the men tried to translate macho into a couple of unbuttoned shirts. But they knew what they were doing and possibly even why.

And that is what irritates me about this whole ‘wolf, wolf’ scenario. Is there any actress so dumb that she doesn’t know why a top angle shot is being framed. Or why she is made to bend low and look seductively into a camera. Or when the camera follows her butt. Oh come on, I know actresses who know which angle they look better from…and I am not talking facial profiles.

So let’s not get all hypocritical and upset when someone verbalises the female equivalent of a cleft in a male  chin…or when someone articulates the sensuousness of a valley.

Seriously, you can’t have it both ways. Show off whatever you feel like. But object to being stared at. What do you want? A stop watch that times men when they stare…and ten seconds later a placard appears says ‘Time Up’…

Learn from the men I say. Keep things to yourself. Tell others only when you’re sure you want to. I haven’t seen any of the young men walking round in costumes that make their groin more attractive or even prominent. And those poor fellows who allow their arms and pectorals to strain their t-shirts with ungainly bulges…they realise very soon that body building works first on the brain and converts intelligent matter into dumb muscles faster than you can say Arnold Schwarzenegger…ooops, sorry. Didn’t that hulk become Governor of an American State? Aah well…Americans

My deal with the Sanghis when I worked with them for the launch of Vaartha was very simple. There was a fee and they had to look after my food, transport and travel arrangements.

So when we had to go to Sanghinagar for meetings or shootings their car would come and collect me and then drop me back at the end of the day. Of course, when I say their car, I mean a Taxi from one of their vendors.

One morning, when we had planned a 6 am shoot at Sanghinagar I asked the Taxi Fellow to come pick me up by 4 or 430 am. He arrived on time and I got in…and promptly went to sleep. My confidence was that a Sanghi Driver should know where Sanghinagar was.

So I just told the driver my destination and immediately dropped off to sleep. The idea was to catch up on my sleep in the hour or so that it would take to reach the location.

When I woke up however, it was broad daylight and we were speeding on the Vijayawada Highway. Even before I could get my bearings the driver turned slightly towards me and asked innocently…”Sahab…Sanghinagar Suryapet kay baad aatha, ya pehle”.

A quick glance at the milestones showed me that I was in the outskirts of Suryapet and almost halfway to Vijayawada.

I looked at the watch, looked at my surroundings…and I knew we were going to be horribly late for the shoot.

So we took a U-Turn and headed back to Sanghinagar. We lost almost the whole morning session. But the Sanghis were very understanding and did not make a big issue of the mistake.

Till date however I cannot understand how a Sanghi Driver didn’t know where Sanghinagar was. Hundreds of explanations, hundreds of theories…but that was a surprise and taught me never to take anything for granted and most importantly, never to sleep in the back seat of a car that did not know where it was going.

Another day, an old…really old driver had to replace our regular driver for something or the other. We drove on to Rd. No. 12 Banjara Hills and I was taken aback when just after turning into the most crowded road in Banjara Hills, the car screeched to a halt. And the driver got down in a trance.

When we asked him why, he told us that the last time he had been on this road was when the old Nizam was alive and this stretch used to be a jungle where panthers walked around.

As I look back now I think I have to admit that these two incidents with drivers are the most memorable in my book. And almost as good as the story of Gopal, my driver in Assam (provided by the erstwhile Brooke Bond Company) who dozed off when driving us from the airport to the guest house and requested me to drive. He then directed us to an office where he picked up his recently issued License, much to our wonder and worry. The next week or so we drove all around Assam with the help of my cameraperson Kallol Maitra who was mainly at the wheel, with me pitching in once in a while.

As we were driving to the airport at Gauhati on our way back, Gopal whose only significant contribution on the trip was that he washed and cleaned the car everyday told us that he was very tired and that he would apply for a week’s leave the moment he had dropped us off at the Airport.

Applause, right? But if you are up there on stage and you can hear it, does the spelling matter? Or the accent you didn’t even try to lose. Or the English which may not have been your comfort language. What matters is the story. And the story telling. And the environment that actors create, the mood they set…and so on.

Tonight at LaMakaan, the Lord Chamberlain’s Men led by their directorial knight Riyaz Usman and his young son Zayaan, took us back to the horrors of the Second World War and made us laugh.

They used a powerful and well known story – Anne Frank’s Diary – and a very old Telugu Film style of theatrics and background music…and transported us into a time the world is trying everything to forget.

Everything went right for them today. The rustle of the rain cover matched the music in timing and frequency. The LaMakaan cat walked on to stage as if on cue…just as Peter was looking for his cat Mooshi.

The Malayalam accent, the broken English…nothing could distract from some wonderful performances. Characters who stood out were Anne and Peter (Namita Ramesh and Piyush Ram) of course…their innocence and confidence was amazing. Lakshmi Suja who played the rich kid/brat with a fur coat was a riot. And Snehal Hattikudur was at her normal ebullient best, mothering this motley crew of family and guests and coming to terms with a disconnected daughter.

What really took the cake however was the way the team used the LaMakaan stage. Every inch of space was used, the stage, the steps, the door…in fact I wouldn’t have been surprised if the toilets above the stage were made part of the set.

I was told that there were some tech issues yesterday, but today the sound was bang on.

As I listened to the anguished voice of young Anne, a sound of hope and courage, the story unfolded with a layered curtain like effect…how the incarceration started on an upbeat note…and how the long duration of cooped up madness took its toll on everyone. And how the dynamics of the group changed the moment one extra man (played angrily by Utkarsh Dixit) arrived…and there was less to share among more.

I liked it when Riyaz announced that the group was all about experimenting with different genres, and he must be complemented for having discovered some significant talent. Well done gentlemen as perhaps the original Lord Chamberlain would have said.

Cheers.