Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan’s theatre festival featured a range of themes

Tiruchiyai Meeta Sundarapandiyan, a tamil play by Karpanai Kudhirai was staged at Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan in Chennai
| Photo Credit: S. R. Raghunathan

Theatre Karpanai Kudhirai’s Tiruchiyai Meetta Sundarapandian is about three people, all trying to run away from their problems. After much haggling, taxi driver Sundarapandian (Rajbharath) agrees to take Mohanapriya (Subhiskha), to Tiruchi. Mohana is running away from home for a month! On the way, Peter (Navaneeth), a reporter hoping for a scoop in Tiruchi, and Thanikachalam (Paramesh), who has been rejected by his sweetheart, also hop on. The so-called problems of all three are exaggerated. In the case of Mohana, all she wants is her mother’s attention. Peter, very much in love with his wife, is unable to come to terms with her premarital romance. Thanikachalam’s love is just an online one. And yet, he wears a woebegone expression. With his earthy philosophy, Sundarapandian eventually helps his passengers bury the ghosts of the past.

From Tiruchiyai Meeta Sundarapandiyan
| Photo Credit:
S. R. Raghunathan

Thanikachalam was amusing with his mixed metaphors and his torrent of meaningless messages. Was the character Peter deliberately named so? In Tamil Nadu, “talking Peter” means to show off by talking in English all the time. And this is precisely what the character Peter does in the early stages of the play. Snippets of songs from old Tamil films, giving a hint about the scenes to follow, was a smart touch.

Writer-director Vedarun Rajkumar safely said in his introduction that the play was “attempted humour.” It was precisely that. Arunkumar’s journey to Tiruchi was well begun, but he has to travel a lot more to come up with a full fledged comedy.

Revisiting history

A scene from Blackout.
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement

In Theatrekaran’s Blackout, (directed by Raghavender Siva and Sabarivas), Namasivayam (Bharath Vinayakamurthy) is an inveterate miser yet his son tries to cadge money off him. Namasivayam’s daughter is in love, but her father will not give his consent to the marriage. Namasivayam takes a young, attractive Manjula’s compliments to be true, not realising it’s just a way to get him to donate to a charitable cause. There is going to be a mandatory blackout that night, necessitated by the 1971 Indo-Pak war. Each character makes secret plans for the night, unbeknownst to the others.

The daughter plans to elope. Namasivayam’s wife decides to help her brother without her husband’s knowledge. Namasivayam decides to have a rendezvous with Manjula. As if this were not enough, a drunkard wanders into Namasivayam’s house. A man with a severe stomachache comes in to consult Namasivayam’s son, who is a doctor. And all this happens at the same time. There is a hilarious mix up, as each of the characters enters the house where lights have been switched off. The stage was, of course, fully lit, and if not for the excellent acting of the team, and the carefully choreographed direction, the scene would have fallen flat. The characters bump “unseeingly” into each other and mistake their own relatives for someone else. When the lights are back, everything is sorted out. While the entire cast played their roles well, acting honours go to Bharath Vinayakamurthy as Namasivayam. Good show, team Theatrekaran.