Review by Rahima Begum
Founder and Co-Director of Restless Beings
Lata’s cheeky, fiesty and confident personality was infectious and likeable. She was bold and colourful with her language, and despite her failed attempts at speaking French or grammatical errors in her English, she was very upfront and confident in nature and embraced these hiccups. The scene began with expressions of her love of perfume and trying her uttermost best to distract and get the attention of Shubarna - an academic in the process of working on a research paper and sitting on her desk trying to focus. This playful teasing between the ladies was perfectly captured, with great timing, the right level of humour that was both a little scandalous but hilarious too. The audience was amused and within a few minutes of the opening scene we were most certainly hooked.
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Slowly the play unraveled their characters. Lata’s confidence, her beautiful singing voice, her curt but lovable approach, alongside Shubarna’s affectionate aura, and almost motherly approach to their friendship and her slightly prudish essence was a real joy to see. The play developed further with a third character and the most boldest of them all, the eyebrow raising Mou. A passionate journalist who lived her life challenging the status quo. Her many boyfriends, lack of care for the world and what it thinks, smoking, drinking and swearing marked the signs of a very confident and somewhat ‘happy in her skin and life’ woman. But through the play, we grow to understand just how vulnerable, loving and affected she was by the many who let her down. We begin to also see how she brought strength and courage to the lives of the other two protagonists. Her role was pivotal in this play and I felt instantly changed the energy and dynamic between the other two characters.
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I loved it and cannot even think of any constructive critique for the team so I must stop at the compliments only. The characters were believable, funny and sincere in their delivery, the stage was perfectly thought out and the timing and humour and dialogue poignant and relevant.
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Well done to the entire team. I feel there is a little Mou, Shubarna and Lata in all of us.
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This play enabled us to enter the lives of three women, who in a patriarchal society were dismissed, outcasts, and struggling to find acceptance in their community because of their way of life, age and gender. They were everything ‘they should not be’ in the time and society they were situated in. As the play develops, dark secrets surface, but their friendship is what binds the narrative and reminds us of what keeps us elevated and going in times of trouble.
Issues such as domestic violence, affairs, societal insecurities, rejection by community and culture, lack of companionship, travel and money, jobs - are all included in this play. A true ‘slice of life’ production which I thoroughly enjoyed and connected to.
