Avanti sashays into Lahore

Another musical comes to the city with the promise of dance, music and laughter.

LAHORE:

Bright lights, tasteful dancing and bundles of energy marked the premiere of the musical Avanti this Saturday at Al-Hamra Auditorium in Lahore. The play was a rendition of the Indian film Aja Nachle and focused primarily on song and dance. Starring a variety of local theatre talent, Avanti aimed to divert the audience’s attention from the chaotic events in the country.

The theme of the play revolved around reconciling culture and expression with tradition and values – a popular concept, which poses interesting questions to the public.

The film and the play have already been performed in India, as a semi-adaptation of the Brazilian film Xuxa Requebra – which revolves around an ex-student of a dance academy, who has to prevent her school from being sold to drug-dealers.

“We had several options but they were either dry-comedies or musical and tragedies,” said producer Javed Ahmed Saeedi. “So we ended up short listing Avanti because we wanted to do something that was captivating and could, for two hours, distract the audience from the mess in the country.”

Director Flora Mahmood, a trained dancer from New York, succeeded in creating a simple yet colourful backdrop with motifs, floral designed pillars and strobe lights. Furniture was kept minimal due to the amount of dance performances. She also added several innovative tactics such as background narration and audience interaction, which succeeded in engaging the crowd and creating a high-energy atmosphere.

The choreography was reminiscent of contemporary Bollywood and seemed like an adaptation of the soundtrack from the film Aja Nachle. The introductory seven-minute-long dance to Rahat Fateh Ali Khan’s song “O Re Piya” seemed endless – despite the inspiring choreography. This was, however, followed by spectacular dance routines on songs including one on “Aja Nachle”. The use of professional dancers helped maintain a very sophisticated level of coordination and skill throughout the play.

The play began with a dramatic voice-over by Mahmood, telling the audience that Avanti was a sanctuary for dance and arts in a conservative village. It had been closed after the departure of Khwaaish (Sundas Jamil), who left to pursue a highly successful dance career in New York. After several years Khwaaish returns, only to find that Avanti has been shutdown and is being converted into a shopping mall. It is at this point that she meets Sheila, a eunuch played by Eice Khatana. His performance, bubbling with hilarious innuendo filled dialogues captivated the audience, who loved the fact that the character would leave the stage to interact with spectators during musical numbers.

“People really love the character, I think it also helps provide a form of desensitisation regarding eunuchs and different individuals in the society,” said Saeedi. “We had thought of having a sardar or a sheikh, but this seemed to be the best in terms of entertainment and comedy.”

Another aspect of the play’s adaptation included a reference to the South Asian and Arabic version of Romeo and Juliet, commonly known as Laila and Majnu. Hashim Imran, a regular on the theatre circuit played the role of the forgetful senior house officer who falls in love with Mehek Gulfam (Rubia Khan). Huzaifa Akber played the role of Fahad Khan  – the cheeky politician, but failed to do justice to the role.

Overall, the play was technically sound but lacked depth in the script and left the audience wanting for more. However, at the end of the day, the out class choreography and variety of dance performances makes the play a must watch for all those interested in dance.



Published in The Express Tribune, July 19^th, 2011.

Correction: Due to an editing error, the earlier version of the article gave wrong names of the actors. The article has been updated with the correct names.