Udaan Performing Arts presented a Marathi play Olakhlat ka sir (Do you recognize me Sir), written by Yogesh Soman, at Lamakaan, recently.
The one-act short play revolved around two characters, a veteran theatre artiste, writer and director and a young girl trying to learn the nuances of theatre from him. However the reason behind the girl barging into the house of the artiste was to bring him out from his present state of affairs. He is a man who shunned everything in the world after he lost interest in theatre which he had loved all these years. Having trained several young people to master the art of acting to and seen them grow up, he realises that they all use him as a tool to gain something but leave him alone later. Disgusted he decides to live all alone, shunning everyone.
With the help of her grandfather, the girl stumbles upon the veteran artiste and tries to evoke interest in him again to relive the past glory and also train her in acting. Initially he refuses to help her; however her continued perseverance leads him to accept and he starts training her in basic acting skills. The girl is thrilled that she could succeed in bringing him out of his shell and start a new chapter all over again.
Superb performance by Bhagyashree Tarke as the girl and equally composed acting by Saurabh Gharipurkar as the veteran artiste kept the audience interest till the last. The scene where the girl mimes sipping a cup of tea was very well done by Bhagyashree. The play could have been a little longer and could have shown glimpses of the acting prowess of the theatre artist.
However the play seemed to end abruptly. The settings were good with appropriate lighting on the stage done by Krishna Shukl and music by Vinayak Raikhelkar.
The backstage support was provided by Ashish, Richa Jain, Madhuri, Pranav, Asutosh, Sanjeev Acharya and Siddesh Dharmadhikari. The play was directed by Saurabh Gharipurkar.
