Oh God - A refreshing new play from EVAM - Review

Today, I went for the premiere of evam's new production, 'Oh God!'. I had heard a lot about evam from various friends of mine and hence the hype had built up. The ticket was priced at Rs. 250, a buddy-you-better-be-good number for me. So, my fingers were crossed when I reached Sivagami Pethatchi auditorium of M. Ct. M school, Mylapore. I had reserved tickets earlier in the nice little web site which evam has put up. They do not actually ask us to pay online, but they just give us a confirmation number, which we can quote at the venue and buy our tickets. Not sure how this will work out when they really run to packed houses though, since one can always reserve a seat and not turn up later.

Scheduled start was at 7:15 and the stage was thrown open promptly on time. This premier show goes to the aid of National Association for the Blind. So, people from that association made formal opening speeches, and even had the quintessential event-opener Nalli Chetty releasing their souvenir (Heresy here, but, well, I am so tired of seeing him on so many stages now, I can't suppress that little smile of mine, when I see the old man on again. Thankfully, he did not start on one of his speeches).

The play opened with three scantily clad youngsters, much to the surprise of the audience (or so I thought). That set up for a nice little ice-breaking tickle, quite a creative way to start the play. What unfolded was a crazy ride through the 'complete word of god' as they call it. The whole of Bible, old and new testaments, the complete text. Highly intelligent humor at places, slapstick and physical humor at places and childishness at some places, the play had all the elements to cater to a wide mix of audience.

KK, shu-shan and TMK are three youngsters (hope I got the names right). They embark on a journey to interpret the word of god. They want to understand what the heck it all means. Without giving away much of the details, I will just say that their way of interpreting things is certainly not what we would call normal (partial spoilers ahead! won't give away the full fun though)

In this roller-coaster ride, creation becomes a musical, the geneology-tree represents a mass bigotry (well, who can argue with that!), noah's ark is subjected to never-seen-before treatment, computers come much before the wheel, three magi are far from the wise men that we know, David slays Goliath in slow-mo with background playing Chariots of fire (much like Jim Carrey running with a milk jug in Bruce Almighty), Moses has a tough time coming to terms with the God's name, Jesus Christ becomes a funky individual and Leonardo Davinci gets a chance to turn, spin and probably revolve in his grave. Basically all hell breaks loose! History takes a new shape as events are deconstructed in a ruthlessly crazy manner.

The audience loved the show. Every end of scene was lauded. Every George Bush jibe was welcomed with uproar. Every antic dished out by Shu Shan and TMK had the audience in splits. The depiction of the Last Supper was too good. As soon as I saw the prop coming in, I knew that it was going to be a laugh-riot. I was proved right very soon. How the Bible is diluted and diplomatized to gain common man acceptance was beautifully depicted, while I must say that evam may expect some weird comments and criticism. After all, this is the country that banned the Da Vinci Code movie, while the lands of christianity were happily watching the movie and suffering the consequences.

That being said, there is a disclaimer at the beginning of the show, which I thought was unnecessary, since the basic understanding is that this is a spoof. A spoof is supposed to be scandalous. They are definitely not coming up with a moral at the end of the show, and we, as audience, aren't expecting any. If any of those conventional oldies are going to be offended by the show, they will anyways get up and shout/leave at, say, the foreskin scene, disclaimer or no disclaimer. I was ROTFL in that scene and I got curious looks from people around me.

The play is 2:30 hrs long, longer than most of the Hollywood movies that hit the screens, but still they manage to keep the audience engaged, and in most of the times, writhing with laughter on the seats. Thankfully for the actors, there is an intermission of 15 minutes (which is introduced again in a creative manner). The play can actually go on uninterrupted for the whole length of 2:30 hrs, but we do need a bladder break and the three poor folks who are shouting on-stage need a drinks break. I am amazed at the energy shown by the three, since the show demands complete focus of all three of them for the whole duration. They are at the thick of things in every scene. They showed awesome commitment and enthusiasm and were obviously visibly tired by the end of the show.

The chemistry between the actors was spot on. The intonations, stresses and pauses were all there in the right places. The timing was almost always correct, though there appeared to be a few moments when the actor was disoriented by the lights, which either went off too early or too late on the scene. There were very few slip-of-the-tongues and definitely acceptable, this being their first show of this production.

Two very refreshing aspects of the play were:
1. All the three actors were fully aware of each dialogue that was spoken. They knew what they were talking about. I suppose that is one of the fundamental aspects of this troupe.
2. Audience interaction: This was evident throughout the play. At every given opportunity, some feedback/interaction was expected from the audience. There was a seperate section post-intermission which gave umpteen opportunities for the whole bunch of audience to be part and parcel of the play.

This being my first look at evam's plays, I was delighted to see these. I think these are common in all evam plays.

Some other things that I noticed:
1. Audio: I think evam has been doing shows in this very auditorium even since they started off. For such experience, their understanding of the auditorium acoustics was found wanting. Most of the scenes, they did without microphones (which I found very commendable given the duration). But, when they put their musical shoes on, they stressed on carrying their mics. Unfortunately, their decibel level with and without the mic was the same, and hence whenever they wielded the mic, a section of the audience automatically closed their ears in fear. This subtle difference has to be understood, for a much more pleasant audience experience. Similarly, The background music/sounds were too loud at times, and they ate up some dialogues.
2. Props: Noticed that the actors fumbled with the props in some situations. I am sure it is because the show is going live for the first time. Whenever a prop is shown onstage, there is an immediate expectation that it would be handled properly. So, even the slightest fumbles unfortunately attracts attention.
3. Cues: For the full length of the play, the actors dished out/followed cues commendably. Only in very few places, they missed or gave the wrong cues (for example: in the magi scene, TMK probably gives out the 'look up there' cue in the wrong place, when they are supposed to continue in the scene with the theological discussion). It was not very visible to the audience, who were too busy handling the continuous string of laughter.

The show was executed with such perfection, that only these minor points were visible.

I have to definitely mention about the singing part of it. It was an enthusiastic display and nobody really would bother much whether they really sing well or not. But, the words weren't very clear when the singing was on. I had to concentrate real hard to catch the words, for I was sure every other line had a bombshell packaged in it and I didn't want to miss out on any. That might be another area which can be improved upon.

I never had even an inkling that the evening will be so much fun! It was a wholesome entertainer in an entirely unconventional way. I have already decided that I will catch up with an evam show every weekend as they celebrate their 150 shows this season. Roll on folks! You rock!

Peace out!