The Blue Mug Blew Me Away?

Yesterday, I went to see the play, The Blue Mug, directed by Atul Kumar, starring Rajat Kapoor, Vinay Pathak, Ranvir Shorey, Sheeba Chadha, Munish Bhardwaj, and Shipra Singh. The play was about the capricious and fickle nature of memory.

The ordinary blue-coloured mug gifted to one attaches cherished memories and happy associations as it becomes a part of one’s lived reality. But over time, as it becomes special, it also gets chipped, the handle breaks, but one still holds onto it tight, having endowed it with significance and reverence, one fights those who wish to throw the special thing away. The mug becomes a symbol of memory’s tenacious hold on one’s life, just as one holds on to memory, in a viciously cyclical way. And when that memory is lost, one’s self is lost. That is one of the points the play was trying to make, as I see it.

I liked the play in most parts. I had problems with it, but I still think it was one of the better ones I have seen in the recent past. I didn’t think it was such a laughter-riot, it was funny in parts, but not ROFL at all! The humour was dark and disturbing, which was lost on most people in the crowd who were awful wannabes who came because they got to see famous actors live.. It is the illiterate masses who enjoy cuss words being said out loud in theatres (film or otherwise), not sensible thinking, intellectual human beings. It is children who enjoy clown jokes, not adults. The only legitimate laughter was the small child’s sitting a little ahead of me, who could not have had the maturity to understand the play’s serious undertones.

I know the audience's response is vital to an artist, especially when the economics of the production of art comes into play, but darn! shouldn’t it be the right sort of response? Most people would have gone home thinking it was lots of fun, “made me laugh so hard”! When the whole point of it is the silence which follows when the laughter stops.

Nonetheless, the acting was superb, and script wasn’t bad at all. The best character was definitely Ranvir’s Joginder – the lost soul whose memory is stuck in 1983. And my favourite scene has to be the chaotic walkabout wherein actors recounted, in fragments, past events – old and recent – including a self-reflexive account of the play itself. Also good was the childhood games pantomime by Vinay and Sheeba. My least like scenes were the “tweak” scene and the one I got a decent photograph of, shown below:

Most of the actors in this photograph have the same expression Vatsun probably had throughout the play, sitting next to me! We all agreed that the worst scenes were all of the wannabe modernist/absurdist/existential kinds. The most genuine were Joginder and shrink at the two ends of the stage, in the midst of a counselling session.

It may not have been the best play I have ever seen, but wasn't the worst one either! I give it 3.5 stars out of 5.