Nivedita Pohankar's TIME BOY educates and entertains. It is a light play with a resounding moral, ''If you are consistent with your restlessness you can achieve anything in the world.'' TIME BOY is about seven year old Murli's delightful escapades as he seeks out the answers to his boundless curiosity. Unlike his friends Sammy and Rohan, Murli finds no joy in fleeting childhood experiences and learns little from structured classroom studies. What he yearns for instead, are the many lessons that can be learnt from the natural world around him- from staring at clouds and collecting earthworms. His mounting curiosity soon turns into a wish to peek into his own future. No longer content with being a child he wants to conquer time and step into the world that beholds his future.
Elements of science fiction, fantasy, and social satire come together and are reminiscent of Pohankar's earlier play WHAT A LOTA. Since this is a children's play, director Makarand Deshpande has imposed upon it another added dimension of allegory. Each of the characters is also symbolically an animal- Murli is a penguin, his mother is a mouse, and his father an elephant. His friends are a duck and a zebra while his teacher is a giraffe. The animal head gears and animal inspired gestures evoke quite a few laughs while simultaneously adding another layer of meaning to the text. Light and sound too are complementary to dramatic movement. Murli's journey into his future through a time-machine brilliantly uses lights to create special effects that evoke gasps of amazement from the little ones in the crowd.
The play boasts of several robust punch lines which are backed by the superb comic timing of its cast. Hidayat Sami doesn't betray Murli's character even for a split-second. Whether he is rinsing his eyes with imaginary water, brushing his teeth, contemplating the mysteries of time, abhorring pumpkin, or wearing a penguin's flippers, he is still the Time Boy that Pohankar writes of. He puts on an adorably childish accent, but his performance is immaculate. Nivedita herself charms us with her Bengali accent, her simplicity, her mousy movements and her striking calm as Murli's mother. Amruta Sant plays a Punjabi-pataka-fashionista-mom Mrs.Chadda. She hits you like a thunderbolt of laughter. You are sure to crack up with every line that she speaks. Her antics are hilarious. I for one, found myself emulating her ''hippo walk'' as soon as I was alone - ''Hip Hip Chest Chest!''
A few things in the play need tweaking though. Among them is a long drawn election scene which seems somewhat irrelevant to the movement of the play and fails to appeal to most of the young ones. There are also many lengthy and repetitive exchanges between Murli's parents. TIME BOY lumbers slowly towards its end. Tedious scenes run counter to the vivid ones, making the enterprise inconsistent. The ending not only punctures the built-up fantasy and wish fulfilment that lie at the heart of the play but also appears abrupt and untidy. But in toto, TIME BOY is filled with frolic and fun along with some thoughtful teachings for children and parents alike.
*Asma Ladha holds a Master's degree in English Literature and Applied Linguistics. She is an applied linguist, a freelance critic, a research student and a poet.
Elements of science fiction, fantasy, and social satire come together and are reminiscent of Pohankar's earlier play WHAT A LOTA. Since this is a children's play, director Makarand Deshpande has imposed upon it another added dimension of allegory. Each of the characters is also symbolically an animal- Murli is a penguin, his mother is a mouse, and his father an elephant. His friends are a duck and a zebra while his teacher is a giraffe. The animal head gears and animal inspired gestures evoke quite a few laughs while simultaneously adding another layer of meaning to the text. Light and sound too are complementary to dramatic movement. Murli's journey into his future through a time-machine brilliantly uses lights to create special effects that evoke gasps of amazement from the little ones in the crowd.
