The personal gets theatrical

INTRO: Six of the India's best stage actors come clean on quirky, personal memories in a play

Understanding the essence of The Blue Mug can get difficult. It is a play based on a case study titled, The Lost Mariner from Oliver Sacks' The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat. In a parallel realm, the play has four actors sharing their personal memories. On one hand there is the doctor-patient story that is derived from Sacks' essay, on the other the actors bounce off each other's memories. The Guide gets the cast and director to tell you what you can expect.

At: Rangsharda Auditorium, near Lilavati Hospital, Bandra Reclamation, KC Marg,
Bandra (W). Call: 26430544.
On: February 20 and 21, at 8 pm
Tickets: Rs 200 and Rs 500

Director speak
"It's not all about psychology and catharsis. It has an underlying comic tone and some very poignant moments that audiences are sure to connect with. New actors have joined us and the play has changed since it was first staged in 2002. Some of the actors thought that the memories they had shared with audiences last time, were not relevant any more. So, those have altered too."



Ranvir Shorey, as the patient
My character is 40 years old but suffers from a syndrome because of which he has no memory after he turned 20. He is incapable of making fresh memories and has a clear sense of history only up to a certain point in life. Although my character is straight out of the case study, we have Indianised him a lot. I've had to delve into my own memories to bring that Indianness to the character.

Sheeba Chaddha, as herself
I share varied memories, some from childhood, others about colours and smells from another time; some are quirky in nature but they don't necessarily follow a chronological order. Some memories have had a major impact, the 1984 riots, for instance.

Munish Bharadwaj, as himself
I have replaced Joy Fernandes from the original cast (who Atul Kumar insists he misses very much) but I'm not just replacing his character. Since I am new to the play, I had to find incidents from my life that could fit into the structure of the play. I talk about my childhood in Delhi, my school, family and incidents that unfolded while I was growing up, like the Emergency.

Konkona Sen Sharma, as the doctor
The doctor and patient's characters are juxtaposed against the other characters in the play because we are the only ones who aren't delving into our memories. The doctor and patient are trying to show how memory works when it's faulty or something goes wrong.

Rajat Kapoor, as himself
Since some of us are playing ourselves, we had to construct our image through snatches of memories, from the inane to the significant. I could have talked about FTII or my daughter's birth, but I haven't. Instead, I start off talking about how I grew up in Delhi in a joint family with a lot of people around me at all times. How there was always something happening, always a reason to celebrate. And when there was nothing, we would simply celebrate change of season. It is something that anyone in the audience can connect with.

Vinay Pathak, as himself
We don't play characters. But we are storytellers and the stories we recollect are from our own memory. It is the truthfulness of these memories that is endearing. I talk of teachers in boarding school, what my father was going through, when I was a child and what happened when someone in the family first learnt to ride a bicycle.