Andhra Pradesh - Visakhapatnam   

Neil Simon’s ‘Chapter Two’ at The Park

Laugh riot: A scene from Neil Simon’s play ‘Chapter Two’ being performed by Delhi’s theatre group ’Slap on Greasepaint’ at The Park hotel in Visakhapatnam on Monday.

VISAKHAPATNAM: English theatre has finally made a fledgling entry into the city. Theatre enthusiasts were treated to a rib-tickling yet thought provoking play titled ‘Chapter Two’ by one of America’s most successful comedy playwrights -- Neil Simon – performed by theatre group “Slap on the Greasepaint” from Delhi at the second Supper Theatre of the season at The Park hotel on Sunday evening.

A work of art unparalleled in the comedy genre, the play with its extremely engaging storyline, flesh and blood characterizations and smart and crisp dialogues was one of those rare plays where one can’t help but smile and say “Yes this has happened to me”. Simon, however, never loses his comic streak through the pages of the script. The cheekiness and uninhibited sexuality of the characters keeps the play spiced up and the audiences in splits non-stop.

Chapter Two is the story of two people George Schneider and Jennie Malone who discover each other at the threshold of a new chapter in their respective lives.

A case of mistaken identities brings the recently widowed George and the recently divorced Jennie together in a whirlwind romance.

A hasty wedding and a disastrous honeymoon opens up several doors to the past, both George and Jennie are too scared to enter. How an individual’s past traps him in his memories and makes it impossible to do that thing we casually call “moving on”.

How does he reconcile his past and move ahead with Jennie? Do they give up or work things out? These are a few questions the play raises and tries to find answers to in its two acts.

Directed by Vishal Verma who enacts the character of George, the play swirls around some of the complicated zones of life and relationships in a witty and humorous way. Greasepaint was founded in the city of Delhi in the year 2007 by a group of young theatre enthusiasts with the sole ambition of exploring the immense possibilities of this powerful medium.

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