You can get away with a lot of nuisance with a name like Blah n Blah, but what if the performance actually turns out to be blah? That was precisely what happened at the National Academy of Performing Arts (Napa) International Theatre Festival, when the combined genius of Sunil Shankar and Joshinder Chaggar managed to execute a dance drama that was otherwise quite hollow.
The play kicks off with the male lead, Fawad Khan, trying to push some imaginary boundaries, avoiding a state of claustrophobia. His movements are not very acrobatic but make sense to an audience that is not used to movement as a means of narrative conveyance. The boundaries eventually start pushing him back as if the Newtonian idea of action–reaction is being depicted. This keeps on happening until the man is exhausted.
In comes Joshinder Chaggar, the female lead, swinging around the stage like a free bird and serving as the polar opposite of the man who is trying to get rid of his shackles. They finally get together on stage for the first time and the spotlight falls on them.
“I want to build a house,” says the man in a concerned tone. “Deep contentment,” says the female rather imaginatively. These two phrases define the central idea of the performance, which is to seek your place in society and deliver your stance in favour of or against your own ego. This search either leads you to gardens full of bliss or a burning realisation that there isn’t any such haven.
Identity and emptiness are very much the central themes of the performance, which is why the male keeps on dreaming of building a house of his own and the female tries to lick her elbow to gain eternity. Adding to that is the Sisyphean action of the main lead carrying a block on his back, which is representative of the social concerns that hinder him. On the other hand, the female lead is trying to decipher the hole in her stomach, which is a physical manifestation of emptiness. This is the evolution of the Adam and Eve rationale, and the writers deserve credit for putting up an original piece of performance. However, they still need to explore other avenues of perspective.
The synopsis suggests that the performance is deeply personal, which is very honest of the artistes who throw their hearts out in their expression. However, there is a fine line between being self-expressive and self-indulgent and that is where Blah n Blah gets really blah, both in terms of what the artistes are trying to convey and how they are conveying it.
The central problem with Blah n Blah is that it is supposed to be a movement piece, but the narrative doesn’t go anywhere until the characters say something about the story. The dialogues are funny and Josh and Fawad do share a very interesting and more so, engaging chemistry, but it all fails when complimented with the stylistic choices made by the director. To put it more simply, the sum of things does not equal the whole.
The risk-taker that Shankar is reflects in the production, as he made some very difficult, technically challenging and unorthodox aesthetic choices, such as projecting silhouettes of a character and performing different movements on three different projection screens that were installed on stage. Instead of enhancing the experience, this resulted in a production that is scattered all over the place. The performers and the director try to end with a bang by using some aggressive lighting and musical score choices, but that really doesn’t cope for the half-baked first half and the bland moments that the rather redundant script has to offer.
Khan is a very good actor and that is reflected in his comfort with the dialogue, but his lack of agility came off quite clearly in the movements that seemed to have been imposed on him. This this can be explained by the fact that he was cast only eight days prior to the performance, as Shankar who was to play the main lead backed off due to over commitments with the festival. Josh for a change was very comfortable in acting, which is not really her forte and danced to perfection, which is expected of her. A few needless lulls and inaudible dialogues didn’t really hurt.
All in all Blah n Blah was an avant-garde production that needed a lot more rehearsals before it can holed up to international standards. While the zeal for doing something unique needs to be appreciated, it must not be forgotten that these very artistes have surprised the Napa stage before with mind boggling performances. Remember Eqqus?
Verdict: It’s a typical case of a big challenge slipping out of your control and eventually falling all over the place. Where some of the aesthetic choices were remarkably amazing for Pakistani standards, it was certainly not best of what Sunil Shankar has to offer.
Rating: 2/5
Published in The Express Tribune, March 20th, 2014.
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