Theatre review: Rakesh-Delnaaz bring filmi romance to stage

Two strangers, a cybercafe and a chatroom set the stage for the fun, flirty premise of Kanupriya Theatre Company’s Love Online: The Bollywood Café. The story follows Yash, played by the ever-goofy Rakesh Bedi, as he navigates a divorce, and Payal, portrayed by the effervescent Delnaaz Irani – a single mother with a grown-up daughter – as they set out on a quest to find love online. Set in 2007, the story predates the ‘swipe-right, swipe-left’ era of online dating, when ‘age/sex/location’, aka ASL, was the go-to icebreaker in digital chatrooms.

Thrilled by the anonymity the chatroom offers the pair, both Bollywood buffs, a place to slip into their favourite filmi avatars. Payal introduces herself as Anarkali, while Yash plays it cool, churning out one-liners like, “Rahul, naam toh suna hoga?” When Payal professes her love for old Hindi films, Yash quickly switches gears and settles for Vishwanath. Fresh off the success of Dhurandhar, Bedi at one point gives a nod to his now-famous “Bachcha hai tu mera” line from the film, drawing cheers from the crowd at Delhi’s LTG Auditorium.
The couple’s nok-jhok-bhara romantic sojourn unfolds through cheeky chatroom messages and a generous dose of retro Bollywood song-and-dance numbers, with the cybercafe owner doubling up as the sutradhar, carrying the narrative forward.

The twist? The two are blissfully unaware that their online connection is unfolding in the same cybercafe, even as they sit a few feet apart, pouring their hearts out to each other. Just as their bond deepens and the audience becomes fully invested in their face-to-face meeting, the play ends without clearly revealing how Yash and Payal feel.

While the naach-gaana, complete with a bunch of background dancers, aims to lend this romantic comedy a Broadway musical–like quality, it often interrupts the narrative flow, making it seem as though some dialogues exist only to accommodate the song-and-dance routines in the script. If you’re up for a nostalgic musical trip through the black-and-white and Technicolor era, catch the play when it returns to the city on May 17.

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