Somewhere in Space

I know I have managed to conceal it all these years. But I guess the time has come for me to confess.

You see I have been traumatized as a child. No, not in the way you are thinking. But traumatized I have been. How?

Let me explain.

First of all you must understand that my growing up years were in the sixties. Just a decade after our country got independence. And India was still getting over the freedom struggle. Coming to terms with its new found responsibilities. And discovering heroes in every corner.

Were you a freedom fighter? That was the first question any man, young or old, had to answer. And if you were, the next question would be “Were you sent to jail”. And by a strange process of social osmosis, the questions were tweaked and asked of us, the children of the sixties.

The difference was that we would be asked if our father…or even our grandfather, qualified to be called a Freedom Fighter. Did they protest? Did they go to jail? And the answers to these questions decided quite clearly our place in the hierarchy.

Your father’s stint in the jail…how long it was, or how short…was a benchmark of sorts. How many times he went to jail was the other. And if you were one of those who had left behind everything in Pakistan, you were King.

I hope you are able to understand the scenario that I was brought up in.

Now understand this…

My father was NOT a freedom fighter. I guess that could be forgiven. But even my Grandfather was not. Forget being an anti-English person, he was a sympathizer. He had contributed generously to the War Effort. Donated all his cars…a Plymouth, a Chrysler or was it a Studebaker…to the British Army. And maybe in return he was awarded the title of Rao Bahadur or something. He was also, as has been indicated to me. conferred the ICS.

While one section of the family was proud of what my grandfather had done, most of society was aghast. How could I, the grandson of a British Supporter be a friend of theirs? And while I used my native charm to overcome this particular obstacle, the problem would crop up at the drop of a flag.

Like a famous movie where the hero is branded the son of a thief, I was branded the grandson of a traitor. And that was a trauma I had to live with for years.

Thankfully we moved to Hyderabad, and there the equations changed. No one wanted to know about the freedom struggle. They had their Razakar nightmares to deal with. So slowly and gradually the tortured side of me was pushed into the background.

And I never thought the questions would arise again. How wrong I was.

In the last fifteen years or so, a new benchmark has evolved. It started with the Income Tax Raids. Were you raided? Do you know anyone who was raided? These questions and their answers determined whether you were socially at a level when you could be considered civilized. And sadly I was not raided. Nor did I know anyone who was raided.

Ok, I did know some people. Vijay Mallya. MAM Ramaswamy. And others of that group. But they were not my friends. And did not do anything to add to my stature.

Luckily the IT stigma soon became passé. And other accomplishments began to count. How much money had you managed to raise from the Public Issue Scams. How many cars, how many acres of land, how many foreign trips…all these became temporary milestones.

I was quite comfortable answering all these questions in muted terms. But then, my old enemy resurfaced. Imprisonment!

But this time I was ready. And armed.

I realize now that I have had good friends and colleagues in prison. I’ve had major clients in prison. Some were part of a massive siphoning of funds scam. Others were part of fraud and forgery. Man, I was right up there with the well connected, even if I was not in the well heeled circle.

What can I say? I am only happy that my children need not suffer at the hands of cruel society the way I had to. They can truthfully answer that their father knows a lot of people in prison. They can happily confess that their father has broken the law many a time during prohibition. Oh their Dad is exemplary.

I am however confused. Do I feel happy that my children find me qualified. Or sad that the qualifications I have now are criminal…

It’s a writer’s dream.

To be able to say that this was the most absurd evening I have spent in a long while, and know that my dear friends who put up the play will realize that I mean it as a compliment.

It’s a writer’s dream.

To work with character sketches that are drawn with just three pens. Broad, Medium and Slim. Or as they are called, the Fat Man, the Middle Man and the Little Man. The absurdity of the play is enhanced when the three actors put on role masks and deride everything from Democracy to Desperation.

It’s a writer’s dream.

To work with three distinct sounds. The languages of posh, stiff upper lip, Anglicized Shenoy, of down to earth, rustic, hardy Varma and the near athletic band-standing of an unabashedly vernacular Eggone. And to pepper the soundscape with postman Fadnavis and the Cameo King Shewalkar.

It’s a writer’s dream.

To treat hunger with irreverence. To treat the cunning of survival with respect. To treat alliances of convenience with honor. To stretch the limits of credibility and rationale to absurd levels. To allow humor to creep in uninvited. To allow translation the freedom to stray.

It’s a writer’s dream. But it is also an actor’s challenge.

And last night Vinay, RK, Phani, Nitin and Bhaskar slipped into their roles with panache. Theatre of this kind demands that you do not question the absurdity of what you are expected to do, and in fact allow unfamiliar instincts to take over in the search for more effective, more appealing absurdity. And from the pulpit of Ramakrishna’s Political discourses to the cross of Phani’s crucifiction and to Vinay’s opportunity seeking servility, the actors pushed themselves out of their familiar comfort zones.

It was a pleasant evening. Not too many boundaries were pushed or breeched. But the magic of the horizon was shown to all. And that is something we should be grateful for.

Have you seen those Television Reports about Baahubali? Or what the media is saying. How many crores were spent. How many collected on the first day itself.

Man, the media hype is so much that even I, who normally don’t care too much for Telugu Movies in theatres was tempted.

I resisted the temptation however and even told my friend that I would watch it online.

But fate had other designs.

I was in Madhapur. Finished my meeting by 4pm. And had to stick around in that area till 6. So instead of going to a coffee shop or something I decided to take a chance with PVR in In-Orbit Mall, and much against expectations, got a single ticket between two young couples. Behind me were three young men.

And the movie began.

The beginning was all animation. Ok, I am biased. I have seen phenomenal animations, been part of teams that developed them. And so, please don’t curse me if I tell you that the waterfall animation was so unreal, it was amateur. At best it looked like a good gif that makes the water ripple on a screen saver.

The leaps and bounds of the hero were all so stupendous that it was obvious that there was a lot of rope play going on. Pity the rope wasn’t used to hang some of the people involved in this film.

But the funny part was not on screen. It was around me. On my right I had a girl who was obviously falling prey to the hero’s charm (No. Good Indian Girls do not confess that they think the man’s body is hot). On my left there was a man, who inspite of being accompanied by his partner, made no bones about the fact that Tamanna’s decision to bare all, met with his approval.

The boys at the back were whistling in tune with Tamanna’s heaving little breasts. The girl on my right had a neat little heavy breathing thing going…I didn’t know whether it was her escort who was the cause or the star on screen.

Then came the song sequence.

And the camera went ape-shit about the upper torsos of the cavorting couple. The hero’s chest. The heroine’s breasts. Chest. Breast. Chest. Breast. The visual rhythm was amazing. Strange how the faces got missed out. And the heroine obviously knew how to make the most of her breasts. Or someone must have told her that if she bends forward, her small, almost insignificant breasts hang down and give the false impression of size. Just as the hero must have been briefed about showing off his pectoral muscles.

All this chest thumping cinematography was bad enough. Even the supporting actors started showing their nipples. Tanikella Bharani too was not spared the disrobing. That was when one of the boys behind me made a comment that I found it difficult to stifle my laughter. In fact that was perhaps one of the reasons why I walked out of the movie during the intermission.

What the man said in Tinglish was…this camera person is focusing on the hero’s chest and nipples. He should be doing the same thing for the heroine. Who allowed her to cover her body?

To which the other friend remarked…who knows…after interval, maybe things will change.

I ran out. I did not dare stay back for the second half. Do you blame me?

Oh. And there are two bulls in the movie. One is a huge fellow, more than ten feet tall who gets defeated by the hero. The second was a beefed up hero who should remember never to show this movie to his children when he has them They’d be scarred for life.

It was bold. It was different. But it wasn’t my kind of theatre.

It was experimental. It was the Theatre of the Disconnect. But it wasn’t my kind of theatre.

The actors moved like well oiled cogs in a wheel. The scenes moved ahead at vignette pace. But it wasn’t my kind of theatre.

It wasn’t my kind of theatre. And that’s what intrigued me. For most of the time I was spell bound. I was just looking at the opera on stage.

I was just looking at the clouds that gathered. At the landscape that changed. At the black vs. white battle that took on colorful hues.

Some of the scenes were instantly recognizable. Some took some doing. But as the story unfolded I realized that while this wasn’t my kind of theatre, it was planned mayhem.

The idea of layering the stage with television performances behind the actors…and actors holding giant remote controls, pointing them at the audience…almost willing for them to change like channels…that was good. Not my kind of theatre you understand, but good. Creative. A kind of Urdu…a language that’s written from right to left.

I liked the introductory slide sequence…even though there was a false and silent start. Even though the audience behaved as if they were grouped in alphabetical order.

Fans of Aditi on one side. Fans of Bhagyashree on the other. Fans of Jay Jha on one side. And the many fans of Kanishka sprinkled all over. The cheers were loud and in definite spurts. In an emerging pattern.

The only sound…of music, a mellow nationalistic one. Not my kind of theatre, but stuff that legends are made of.

Questions like “Will Hyderabad ever progress beyond Bedroom Comedies? Can it?” became redundant. “Does Hyderabad have real talent” got answered emphatically.

Mayura and Rahul in poetic spotlight. Sutradhars in a Dramanon play. Harika, that "will-o'-the-wisp", that waif. Flitting across the stage in countless costume maneuvers in a kind of petticoat frenzy.

Oh, the evening was full of individual brilliance. Full of parts that gelled together but only made up a kind of ‘join-the-dots’ kind of a perforated picture. Not my kind of theatre, simply because it was too full of holes, but stunning in complexity that cascaded into simplicity.

And in the final chapter, a Marlon Brando dressed up like ET. Shayantoni, I discovered later, floating across stage with a near anti gravitational mirth. While two actors tore each other into pieces. The Red and Green lights, the red, green and white costumes, the red and green furniture…the string of lights that snaked across the floor in hypnotic meander.

Not my kind of theatre but stunning. I loved the way English morphed into Hindi. Loved the way that body language crumpled stereotypes onto the floor including an endearing one that made Harika fall on stage. Again. A heap that picked itself up, and danced the night away.

That was the key perhaps. The energy. The raw energy. With RK’s calming influence mimicking real life with great effect. KD’s Facebook Posts singing their usual version of “Punning Alive”.

Simon and Garfunkel in drag. Singing “Time it was; and what a time it was. A time of innocence. A time of confidence”.

Bookends. The span of what theatre can do. Especially when it dares to cross the comfort zone of audience likes, and brings down the fourth wall barriers of tragedy, comedy, insanity…

Not my cup of tea, but then they did say that it was Coffee that was being served.