Risqué show on the Pune Highway
"Pune Highway" offered some enjoyable moments too. — Pic. by S. R. Raghunathan
BEING BOLD and courageous may be all right but to be outrageously bold could convey a very different message on stage! The English/Hindi play "Pune Highway" (brought to Chennai by Madras Metro Round Table - 95) by Mumbai-based Rage Productions, staged at the Music Academy this past weekend, had an overdose of coarseness in dialogue interlaced with aptly-timed utterances. Surely, some would have found it rather difficult to consume such cheap words in serious theatre, and being mouthed so often at that. If writer-director Rahul DaCunha thought it was enterprising to offer contemporary casual language, it is time such productions have a rethink. Getting out of the conservative mould calls for a more refined approach even while attempting verbose drama. However, the play offered several enjoyable moments too. In this case, the simple storyline was the director's visualisation of three friends thrown in together in a highway motel after the fourth is stabbed by unknown gangsters, in the dark hours. Their plight and the emotional turmoil within, each feeling helpless and rather guilty for letting things happen for fear of risking their own lives ... the flashback unfolding realistically only through conversation, with just one impressive set of the dirty motel throughout, are in themselves striking attributes of the direction. The warmth in their friendship comes across naturally and is hardly a laboured act ... one stammers, the other lies and yet another jokes. For instance, the bond comes through when one justifies his extra-marital relations: "Arranged marriage sucks. Seema and I have no chemistry at all." Says another: "Chemistry? But is this institution set in a lab?" The stammer of one of the boys was realistic and his emotional outburst about leaving their friend all to himself on the Highway was poignantly portrayed. The street-smart waiter with his Hindi songs and Marathi smattering and the don't-care attitude of the girl with her boyfriend were suitable additions that got the mood across. Rajit Kapur, Rehaan Engineer, Yamini Namjoshi, Shankar Sachdev and Bugs Bhargava Krishna enacted the five characters of the play.
Since the proceeds were meant for building a school for deserving children, it was gratifying to note the tickets vanishing in a jiffy at the counter. Pune Highway is said to be one of Rahul DaCunha's trilogy on friendship series, the other two being `Class of 84' and `Love Letters.'
RANJANI GOVIND
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