Keeping it together

(Clockwise from left) Arnav Bhasin, Pranav Bhasin

There will be a time in the future - and let's hope that it's sooner rather than later - when we will look back at this period and reflect on the gamut of experiences that we have all felt as individuals. Each one of us has dealt with it differently, hopefully with our chin up.

But there are also people who have been locked in romantic relationships during the lockdown. Their equation with each other has also evolved over the past few months, for better or for worse. It's tough being forced away from the person you love. But, distance can also make hearts grow fonder. That seems to be the central message of a new web series called Cabin Fever, which dissects the mental and emotional upheavals that two characters undergo while being separated during the pandemic.

A still from the series

It's a slice-of-life story plotted into three parts, each one reflecting a different month of the lockdown in the city. The boyfriend, played by Arnav Bhasin, is a 22-year-old who has a heart of gold, but no real ambition. His partner, Sanskriti Shukla, clearly pulls the weight in this relationship, facing the pandemic with a sense of practicality that Bhasin's character lacks. He seems instead as if he is constantly teetering on the edge of a mental breakdown, while she, too, sometimes feels as if her world will come crumbling down. These aren't unnatural emotions at a time when mental health crises are more of a clear and present danger than ever before. But will their love pull through? That's the question that the series explores.

Sanskriti Shukla

And in doing so, it also offers time stamps for this period in human history. Director Pranav Bhasin tells us that he hopes that when all this is over, the series can act as a guide for people to figure out what this phase in Mumbai had actually been like. "I hope it becomes a guide of sorts," he says, indicating how one day, surely, all that we are going through right now will be a distant memory. But like we said, let's just hope that it's sooner rather than later.

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