A husband going through a mid life crisis trying to re-capture his youthful days, a workaholic wife, busy saving the homeless who were victims of Tsunami, and working in a magazine, with little time to help hubby revive the romance in their lives. A nosy henpecked neighbor Pawan (Nitin Jagdish), and a has been fading Casanova (Liliput) aptly named Casanova, who’s always ready for action, the play starring actress Padmini Kolhapure and television artist Naveen Bawa, “Abhi to Main Jawan Hoon” was a laugh a minute.
Manu (Naveen Bawa) walks in one fine day realizing that though he is at the peak of his life professionally, he hasn’t been hitting any high peaks lately in his personal life. His wife who used to wear slinky black numbers and made special dishes for him, is now caught up with her own career. The victims of flooding disasters are more important to her than the dry spell that is lasting a little too long in their personal life.
To revive the romance, Manman, as she calls him, walks in one day with all the things that hold those romantic memories for him.. the greens for salad, a slinky black dress, the old romantic K.L Sehgal song-only to be met with a sari clad, bespectacled wife who feels its neither the time nor her age to be on a clothing catwalk. An explosive argument later, when he asks that she quit her job and she refuses and threatens divorce instead, the two decide to go their separate ways.
Before you know it, she has left in a huff and egged on by his nosy neighbor and his Casanova friend, Manu goes for a total personality change. He shaves his moustache off and gets into denim, except that now his back hurts if he tries to be John Travolta on the dance floor and a young girl Sheetal, (Roma Navani) that Casanova has invited from his office under the pretext of a party, and wants Manu to flirt with, ends up calling him uncle.
The neighbor Pawan (ably played by Nitin Jagdish who also did a marvelous job of directing the play) gleefully sneaks in and out, living vicariously through Manu, wishing that his wife would leave him too, and eggs Manu on as well. Manu starts trying to convince himself that its like a jail break for him, that he is free to do as he pleases. Pawan gets high just on that aura of freedom, because he is put on such a tight leash by his wife. As the trio try to make merry, the wife comes back, and sees Sheetal there. Without disclosing her identity she finds out that the young girl is pretty uncomfortable being there, but has done so because Casanova is her boss. Sheetal accidentally finds out the identity of the wife and confronts Manu, and admonishes him for his behavior since he did not even acknowledge her as his wife when she walked in. In spite of that she still went into the kitchen to help finish the cooking since they were expecting guests.
Later when he complains to his wife that she was too focused on her career and he felt very neglected she retorts that he did the same for years to establish himself and didn’t really care about her neglect. Now that she has a job she likes and has established herself she is not likely to leave it at his whim.
In a humorous way, the play explores the complacency that sets in, between a husband wife if the relationship is not nurtured properly. Naveen realizes his mistake on the brink of their impending divorce and that he is still in love with his wife. Padmini walks in wearing the slinky outfit he had initially bought for her and he says he is happy with the way she was. The couple reconcile and look forward to a future with hopefully a better understanding and appreciation of each other.
The script played the superstar’s role in this play. It was crisp, witty and the humor was risqué, impish and everything was so close to real life. The things we say and the things we do as everyman were captured very succinctly in this comedy. Naveen Bawa excelled in his role as Manu. Film actor Liliput was excellent as the aging Casanova. The fact that he is a dwarf adding a lot of spice to his character. Nitin Jagdish as the bumbling nosy neighbor who is petrified of his wife did justice to his dual role of actor and director.
Padmini Kolhapure was her natural self, and as comfortable on stage as she has been on celluloid, since acting is in her genes, along with music, being the niece of Lata Mangeshkar and Asha Bhosle.
Since the play was held on a Monday due to unavoidable circumstances, the audience was sparse, but Padmini said she was thrilled that the reactions and response from the people was so on the money. She’d rather perform before a small but appreciative audience than a huge crowd that is not that responsive.
Kamru Hamrani again ended up bringing a stellar play to Atlanta though I think Atlanta doesn’t deserve plays of such high quality because people don’t realize how unique this genre is, and how scarce good Hindi theater is in America.
I think Kamru ji deserves a lot of appreciation for not giving up or getting disheartened and continuing to do what he believes in – namely, quality shows.