Lost in Yonkers

Just got a chance to be a part of the cast of a play 'Lost in Yonkers'- Neil Simon, a play by the theatre group 'Top Cast' based in Bangalore. As a part of the Deccan Herald Theatre Festival this was one of the 6 plays staged. Lost in Yonkers happend to be the first one!!! The festival kicked off last Sunday, October 24th 2004, at Chowdaiah Memorial Hall, Bangalore.

I was a part of this group a few years back and then took a break due to multiple reasons. Now, I was lucky to get a chance again. The director Mr. N Ravi Kumar who founded Top Cast, was sure to have found the right script for the festival.

It's a family drama filled with satire comedy and full of pathos. The play revolves around a german family in Yonkers, USA during the WWII times. The protagonist in this play is an steel like old lady 'Grandma'..played by Dr.Poornima Vyasulu. 'Aunt Bella', her daughter who has marbles rolling up her head was played by Jyotsana Temkar. 'Eddie', her first son perhaps, father of 2 sons and widower now...was played by Srinath T V. 'Jay', Eddie's elder son was played by Kishore Acharya and 'Arty', the younger on of Eddie's sons was played by Yeshwant Madhusudan. 'Aunt Gert', Grandma's another daughter who has problems in speaking was played by Kshama Kumar. I played the part of 'Uncle Louie' who is a henchman, a small time gangster and mostly a conman and a thief.

The play was well recd. by the audience and the critics too. Though there were a few stumbling blocks in the form of forgetting lines by Aunt Bella and a few by Grandma and few technical movement mistakes, the crowd loved the play mostly for Grandma (sheer acting brilliance) and Arty (Neil Simon put in a lot of humour in this lad's character). The mistakes were either covered up well or were insignificant.

As a part of the advertisement for the festival, there was a snap that was required to be printed in the newspapers. The costumes were not ready yet, so I had to manage with something I had at home..and believe it or not...my snap came in the newspapers. Believe me when I say this...I never looked more funny. As I kept thinking aloud...that snap probably should have come in the cartoon section..hahaha.

Btw, there's one more play coming up...'Listen, Janamejaya'. I am casted as 'Suthradhara' in this play by Sriranga. The group is called Version 1.0 and in my future blogs I shall talk of this play which is due to be staged in Jan 2005. Quite sometime for it.

Well, it was a great experience...altogether. It was nice to be back in theatre....the extreme authority and command that you have when you are on stage and more so when having a monologue just gives me a high. Of course, I also made mistakes...some that I realised and some that my friends pointed out later..

As always...there's a so much to learn in/from/about anything that you do.

Some reviews of the play in the newspapers...

DeccanHerald

IndianExpress