A starry night for Kolkata

The fence in the middle of the road clearly demarcated the two territories. And crossing the fence bordered on tresspassing, literally. Friday, June the 3rd, the stage, or should we say, the screens were set for the clash of the titans, “Paglu” vs “Shatru”.
CT was present at two South Kolkata theatres to catch the madness, mania and magic surrounding two of Tollywood’s ‘blockbuster’ heroes, Dev and Jeet.
‘Black’ magic
“Upore 175, upore 175, neeche 150,” the scalpers swarmed outside the theatre, where “Paglu” stood tall adorned in marigold garlands. The scene wasn’t too different for “Shatru” either. The tickets here were sold in black for `150.
Andar ki baat hai
We beg your pardon for the language but no term can aptly define the madness inside other than ‘khachakhack bhara hua’. In fact, finding one’s way to the seats was even tougher than scaling Mount Everest. And once ‘Deb’ and ‘Dibakar Singha’ make an appearance, the fans and followers burst out in applause and whistles making it almost impossible to hear the dialogues on-screen. Some Dev fans even dress up like him complete with bandana and armed with confetti (thankfully, the nunchaku is limited to the screen) just so they can groove with Paglu each time he shakes and shimmies on-screen.
So, while it was “solid” for Jeet, Dev earned the “jiyo” tag from the public. And while on the public, it went berserk when Dibakar Singha mouthed his fiery lines, sending the baddies flying through the air to the
background tune of “Narsimha, narsimha”.
Fan following
“Devda stands for ‘Desperate’, ‘Excellence’ and ‘Victory’,” said one Dev bhakta, while yet another fan blurted, “Asanti noye, shanti chai, flop noye Dev dar theke hit chai.” Scriptwriters, are you listening? Here are some potential one liners, “Amra pagla hote pari kintu konodino ‘shatru’ hote parbo na,” “Shatru na, Devdar moto mitra koro,” “Apnar meyeke, apnar samne, apnar baritey biye korbo, etai Dev fan club er challenge.”
Okay now here’s from the Jeet camp, “Jeet er mathaye ball. Dev er chokhe jol,” “‘Shatru’r joshe ‘Paglu’ gelo dhoshe,” “Ektai kendra, Dibakar kendra.”
PS: Such was the Jeet craze that one member even turned up in a wheelchair with a tiger balloon to
present to Jeet (Remember he plays Dibakar Singha in the film?)
Starry, starry night
Well, not exactly, for “Paglu”. But with Jeet and Mohna making a pretty picture in white at this
theatre, the crowd had more to cheer for. Even Raj Chakrabarty was surrounded by his chahnewallahs all wanting a piece of their favourite “Rajda”.
Housefull
Not the film, silly. We are hinting at the housefull boards that screamed a full house till Sunday.
Roshni Mukherjee & Ruman Ganguly