Date: 6 October 2019
Venue: Kamani Auditorium, Delhi

“All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players” said Shakespeare in the much loved work As you like it.

With the onset of the pleasant late autumn cool weather and festivities all around, Delhi is on fire with celebrations, shopping and much more. But as Shakespeare said in his much loved piece of work “As You Like It”, the proceedings are somewhat incomplete without a touch of drama.

Therefore, it is also time for a new season of Aadyam plays in Delhi. Season 5 of Aadyam is here and we managed to watch both the plays staged till now in this season. The latest production was something that would excite all book lovers. Khaled Hussaini’s debut and the most loved novel “The Kite Runner” has been adapted for a stage production. The play is directed by Aakarsh Khurana and is part of Aadyam line up of plays this year.

The much accoladed “The Kite Runner” was first published in 2003 and since then has been a favourite among masses and critics alike. The book has already been made in a wonderful film that we watched a few years back and we were hoping the stage production also do justice to the book. The story is so touching and painful you just can’t afford to see a shoddy job done with that. Set in 1975, the poignant tale of two friends Amir and Hassan during tumultuous times in Afghanistan comes alive on the stage in this theatrical adaptation of “The Kite Runner”. Thankfully the director, play write and the entire cast did a decent job of recreating this story as a theatre production.

The story line is the hero here and to be frank when you already know what is coming ahead, the onus is on the cast as well as the director to make sure you watch the play till the end. It is a beautiful feeling to attach some faces to your favourite characters from the book. Amir and Hasan played respectively by Nipun Dharmadhikari and Abhishek Saha do justice to their roles specially when there is no child in the cast and the adult actors have to pull both the ages – kids and adults while assaying Amir and Hasan.

The journey of Amir from Afghanistan to California and then back to Afghanistan is not just a switch of geographical locations but also a journey of emotions, relationships, realisations and towards the end, revelations too. Most among the audience would have read the book and consequently aware of the story. Yet the plot keeps the audience glued to their seats till the climax as the relationship between Amir and Hasan is redefined closer to the end of the play.

All said and done, The Kite Runner is a play that brings back hope, that sometimes past can be fixed too, maybe by not going back in time but by fixing what lies ahead in the future.

Looking forward to watching more plays from Aadyam Season 5.