Venue: Epicenter, Gurgaon
Date: April, 2016
Picture Source: Event Listing

Promoted as a Tom Alter play,  “Delhi-Ciously Chekov” was actually a compilation of three small plays based on Anton Chekov’s stories. Tom Alter played mostly the narrator. All the plays were customised to include Delhi, not just as the location, but also the characters were developed to talk/behave/act like Delhiites… or how the director thinks Delhiites stereo typically are. Loud, boisterous, show-off and big hearted Punjabis is an example. Though we are all for using stereotypes to create some laughter and light hearted comedy but this play crossed from being stereotyped to clichéd within no time and repetitive and boring soon after.

We loved the story of the first play “The Arrangement” and execution was also better than the other two plays. This is about a Punjabi father and son and a prostitute where the father is in a hurry for his son to achieve manhood. On the other side, the son wants to take his own sweet time and loves the shade of care that his over protected father provides. The prostitute’s take on this whole thing was heartwarming and somewhat throat choking.

But this is where the good part ends. After this we were in for some more cliché and yawns. The next play “The Surgery” had nothing to offer. No story line, no fun… This play was a pain in the… no, not tooth.

Similarly the third and the last play “Seduction” went on and on and was more like a theater version of some B grade Bollywood masala film. We couldn’t stand it till the end and left in between. In one line this comedy play in Delhi was “ainnaaaaa vaddaaaa blunder…” (This one’s for Tom Alter… in Punjabi)