05 March,2011 07:28 AM IST | | Aditi Sharma
QTP's latest play, Nostalgia Brand Chewing Gum, is a hilarious attempt that looks at love and having to let go, through the eyes of through the eyes of four characters from everyday life
u00a0
It's a familiar drawing room set. One of the characters -- Adil, played by Tariq Vasudeva -- is pacing around, trying, in all earnestness, to convince the audience and himself that being nostalgic about a relationship is like masticating on a chewing gum that has lost all it's flavour -- you do it because it's a habit.
Diksha Basu, Karan Pandit, Tariq Vasudeva and Kallirroi Tziafetta
rehearse for the play. Pics/ Rane Ashish
This is one of the most poignant moments of the play and Tariq brings out the emotions perfectly. Only, in his enthusiasm he almost knocks the wine glass off the table and topples a beautiful blue glass lampshade.
Suddenly, the buzz in the auditorium has quietened; everybody is concentrating hard on the goings-on on stage. But before Tariq can think it's the impact of a great performance, Toral Shah, the production in-charge, shouts, "Be careful with the wine glass!" The motley bunch in the audience bursts out laughing as day two of the tech run at Prithvi Theatre comes to an end.
Director Vivek Madan describes Nostalgia Brand Chewing Gum as "a really fun, irreverent play that takes the piss out of a lot of things including itself." He adds, "Some of the beauty of the play lies in the fact that the characters are complete cliches -- one is a lovelorn intellectual, the second is a jock who finds his sensitive side, another is the dominatrix while the fourth is a very exotic, almost ethereal girl in a strange land."
Having decided to take on the mantle of a director, Vivek, a Bangalore-based theatre person, thought it would be a "challenge to get out of the rut" and work on the play with a Mumbai-based cast and crew. He believes the play is an ensemble effort in terms of acting as well as production. "The actors have moulded their own characters. There's Arghya (Lahiri) for lights, Toral for costume and set, Nadir (Khan) as a sounding board and Q as a back-up for everything," explains Vivek.
Like the characters, Vivek and QTP members are also taking a trip down memory lane with this play. This is Vivek's third encounter with the play -- the first was in college as an actor while the second was for Thespo, as an actor-director. QTP's Quasar Padamsee recalls the first time that Nostalgia Brand Chewing Gum was staged as part of Thespo 2001, "I remember having a lot of fun during that run, as members of the audience.
So I felt it would be a great play to revisit," he reveals. And like on the previous occasion, they seem to be having a good time with the adapted version of the play.
On: Today, 7 pm and 9.30 pm
At:u00a0 Prithvi Theatre, Janki Kutir, Juhu Church Road, Vile Parle (W).
Call:u00a0 26149546
