Reality check
‘The Interview,' directed by Akarsh Khurana received a standing ovation. The play had the audience roaring with laughter. The humour was spontaneous. Playwright Siddharth Kumar deserves credit for his dialogues. Most of us would have faced an interview and that's the reason why we could relate to the play and enjoy it thoroughly. The play sought to bring out the realities of interviews today. Like the question, ‘What animal would you relate yourself to?' is asked during the psychological round in an interview. And you may not be aware that your interviewer is keen on knowing your date of birth just to see if your sun sign is compatible with theirs; so as to have a long and fruitful relationship with the company. The cast was outstanding but a special mention must be made of Karan Pandit and Kashin Shetty, who played their part with finesse. The play was worth the evening.
Jennifer Paul
Ramapuram
Successful interview
‘The Interview' by Akvarious productions was an absolutely wonderful take on today's cut-throat competition in the corporate world. Kudos to the playwright for being able to satirise the scenario beautifully — the endless interviews and the mad frenzy to stay on top — while giving the audience ample opportunity to laugh out loud. The acting, by the two lead characters especially, was phenomenal. A real treat and truly deserving of all the awards it won.
Nikita Sampath
Adyar
Laugh riot
Akvarious productions did a wonderful job in making me fall in love with words such as theatre, script, cast etc. The play was about a nerve-wrecking interview that a 28-year-old, in desperate need of a job, has to face. The interview takes a twist when the interviewee becomes the boss and says ‘Please take your seat'. The set was appropriate, while the cast did an amazing job. The script was good too. On the whole, there was everything that this 80-minute play wished to accomplish — keep the audience engrossed and entertained.
Ramita Ganesan
Chetpet
Worth watching
“The Interview”, a dark corporate satire, takes the audience along an unusual plot set in a typical typical hierarchical office, with four different characters, displaying varied emotions bright. The over-ambitious protagonist attends an interview for a coveted position. He faces challenges he's least prepared for; somehow copes with the situations to finally land the job. Imaginatively written by Siddharth Kumar and well-presented by Akarsh Khurana, the play exposes the seamier side of the corporate world; where favours are traded, every cupboard has a skeleton, and where success is the only altar. Creative stage setting, sober colours, crisp dialogues and convincing portrayals make this award-winning play worth a watch.
Lakshmi & Kartik Dore
R.A.Puram
Slice of reality
Situated in a corporate office, the play is a dark disposition of the cut-throat battle for success and credit, topped with profound comedy. The proficiently directed performance, which powerfully depicted the extent to which one would struggle, and be ruthless to rise to the top, was one among the plays in the MetroPlus Theatre Fest to receive a standing ovation. The clenched theme of corporate intricacies was crowned with brilliant individual executions, intriguing music and rib-tickling action. This marvellous production, with much more meaning than pitchy humour, the recipient of four theatre awards, is definitely an exceptional masterpiece.
Ekshikaa. S
Island Grounds
Corporate world deconstructed
The ubiquitous (faux) polygraph serves as an unlikely metaphor for the seemingly sophisticated but psychically shallow characters that animate the play. The raison d'etre of the play in due course becomes stripping the characters' emotions of their veneer of elitism, revealing their true identity. Frailties and insecurities inherent in human psyche, machinations of the highfalutin executives, consequentialism as the defining trait populating an ambitious individual's psychological resume are all dealt with in detail. The situation depicted might be a harbinger of a not-too-distant era where human life would become a commodity available for trade, where lie-detectors would replace human ingeniousness, where Machiavellianism would be the desired mantra and where a nation's identity might itself become corporatised.
Narayanan GL
West Mambalam
Not deftly handled
The play began well but midway the director let loose a riot of expletives with an abrupt negative climax. It was a laugh riot for adults and an embarrassment to the young. A big corporate office making a mockery of a job interview could have been deftly handled to add some meaning to the play rather than prolonging the insipid repeat humour. The actors pulled off a convincing act, though it was marked by moments of eerie pauses.
Col. R. Shivanathan
Island Grounds
Well-presented
‘The Interview', a process drama, depicted the protagonist stooping to unimaginable levels to beget a job in a company.The interviewer on his part is interested in recruiting a soulless solution-fixer, who can resolve intra-personal and inter-personal conflicts; by subjecting the interviewee to psychological stress during the interview. By the end of the play both the interviewer and the interviewee win, but at the cost of losing their humaneness. The three-part, hierarchically arranged monotone set, was simple and elegant. The lead actor could have exploited the potential dilemmas of his character. The audience enjoyed and identified with the play, wonder if the critics too felt the same?
Dr.V.Muthukrishnan
Nungambakkam
Intriguing
The play was a fictional expansion on the goings-on in companies. . The script was crisp. Moments of dullness were few and far between. The only hitch: the play was a cliché of the American witty sit-com. The acting credits were visibly for the quirky interviewer, Kashin Shetty. Karan Pandit was convincing as the part jittery and part confident interviewee. Prerna Chawla was impressive as the secretary. Good music, a smart multi-level set and a powerful closing scene went in favour of the play.
Sonal Srivastava
Egmore
Well-narrated
Though not much was expected from the story, it was well-narrated. The sets were impressive and standard of acting really good. Wit and humour in plenty, the secretary was particularly delightful. The interviewers could have emphasised their points to the candidates subtly. All in all, I enjoyed the play because the candidate landed the job he needed so badly.
Moti Shivdasani
Khader Nawaz Khan Road