Mahek Chahal makes her theatre debut with Animal Farm

Watching the desi theatre version of George Orwell’s Animal Farm was an entertaining affair for the city’s theatre aficionados. The play, directed by Atul Satya Koushik, also marked the theatrical debut of Bollywood actress Mahek Chahal.
Improbable equality Instead of targeting communism, the play, which was adapted in accordance with Indian sentiments, showed how politicians gained power after India’s independence and eventually Indians remained what they were – mere slaves.The plot revolved around how, in an imaginary village, animals of a farm revolt against their cruel masters – the humans – and take control of the farm. Snowball, a pig who talks about equality, becomes an eyesore for Napolean, another pig, who wishes to wield his power over other animals. Supported by his sidekick, Squealer, Napolean not only manages to get Snowball out of his way, he also becomes the tyrant at the farm. To the original tenet of ‘All animals are equal’, he adds ‘some are more equal than others’ and it goes on to show how the idea of equality is a utopian one and its implementation is almost improbable.
Dancing over dialogues The rustic tone and the dialogues mouthed by the ‘animals’ in Punjabi, Bengali and other accents, added to the charm of the play. The song composition by Ravi Rao was applauded too. “Our productions have always tried to amalgamate theatre and films. Though they are seen as ‘sister arts’, they don’t mix. When we cast someone like Mahek, we knew her name will draw a huge crowd, which in turn will also give visibility to rest of the actors,” said Koushik. However, Mahek only did an ‘item number’ in the play and had no dialogues. “I wanted to test the waters before jumping in. I’ve tried my hand at a lot of things but never had time for theatre, even though it’s one thing I have always wanted to do. From now, I will try to be part of one production every year. I want to do theatre that’s not just based on fiction, but also sends out a strong message,” she told us.
“The play was well adapted. The folklore style narration was engaging. I liked the character of Benjamin, the donkey, who kept using expletives throughout the play and closed the play with – if we all, as Indians, have accepted inequality and injustice happily, why should then they as animals not be content,” said Anuj Parashar, a theatre enthusiast.