Laughter rings in the house again

Burjor Patel Rashna Karai and Sam Kerawalla at the rehearsal of Laughter in the House 2 at Tata Theatre inset Ruby Patel 83 leads the actresses in the cast PicsBipinacircu00c2u0080u00c2u0088KokateAt 630 PM when we step inside the Seaview Room at Tata Theatre NCPA the cast of Laughter in The House is in the midst of rehearsals With seamless ease Ruby Patel 83 Moti Antia 82 Dolly 80 and Bomi Dotiwala 80mdash all stalwarts of Parsi theatre mdash have the handful of spectators in splits as they bring to life adman Bharat Dabholkarrsquos new skit Cricket With Parsi Women The gag a playful banter between three Parsi women while watching a cricket match is one of the many rib tickling tributes to the communityFive years after Laughter in the House 1 sparked magic at the box office running to packed houses for 10 shows the same team of vintage stars is back with the sequel Taking its name from midday columnist Meher Marfatiarsquos 2011 book titled Laughter in the House 20thCentury Parsi Theatre the show is an ode to the late Adi Marzban who was famous for his farcical content Interestingly the cast is helmed by some of his oldest actors who worked with him for decades However this time around Aatish Kapadia Dinyar Contractor Bharat Dabholkar Meherzad Patel and Rahul da Cunha have been roped in to pay tribute to the maverick with their scripts The revue peppered with skits songs and dance sequences will be showcased on February 19 at NCPAldquoThe last time we used Adi Marzbanrsquos scripts with slight tweaks This time we realised that we had exhausted most of it I admit it was tough to get writers who could match up to Adirsquos jokes which is when we thought of getting Rahul Aatish and others to be part of itrdquo says Burjor Patel 86 who has translated the gags from English to Gujarati and is also one of the lead actors in the play ldquoIn the last five years we lost a few members of the original cast but thatrsquos how life isrdquo he saysSam Kerawalla 84 who directed the first show has been working for over a year to get the second act together Yet he says hersquod have liked some more time With a little more than two weeks to go for the opening he says itrsquos still a work in progress ldquoEvery day we do improvisationsrdquo he says The skits though in Gujarati are easy to follow even for a nonParsi like this writer ldquoParsiGujarati has never been a pure form of Gujarati Itrsquos an Anglicized version for instance lsquohello darling kem chorsquordquo he says The director is also honing the supporting younger cast led by Danesh Irani Danesh Khambata Parinaz Jal Rashna Karai Jasmin Siganporia Meiron Damania mdash some of these are fresh finds from the Draame Bawaas competition introduced last year to unearth new Parsi talentJim Vimadalal 37 who compered the first part is here to observe the rehearsals to collect fodder for his act ldquoI put in my own gags before introducing the main actsrdquo he adds Vimadalal says the idea behind the revival is to showcase the astounding talent of these actors most of whom are living out their twilight years ldquoAll these actors are legends Most nonParsis are not even aware of their work They are phenomenal on stage Most people I know who are in their 80s are not even able to walk properly forget actingrdquoThere will also be a 12minute long antakshari penned by famous script writer Aatish Kapadia ldquoThe eight songs based on popular Hindi and English numbers depict the peculiarity of Parsis without deriding them Itrsquos about their quirks mdash the food habits punctuality flirtatiousness numberdropping mdash all the plus and minuses I feel itrsquos the only religion that celebrates being aliverdquo