Lazy Sunday evening.. Remembered the invite from a friend for a Drama also saw a couple of my friends posted going for the drama. Set .. Start .. Go.. was there in the auditorium one hour before the play started.
Set in the French town of Pondicherry, Midnight hotel prone for loosing all its customers due to spooky incidents that turn them paranoid. The only inhabitants include
- Usha, a widow, the owner
- Vyas- unsuccessful writer and drunkard , who couldn’t remember the last time he wrote a book or paid the rent,
- Hari- ‘late’ Deep’s brother and Usha’s brother-in-law and lover, who drops in just at the beginning of the play,
- Ronnie – Manager of the Midnight Hotel,
- Vidya – who makes money by connecting with the world through the internet, and
- Deep -the man (read ghost) of the play.
The play begins with Hari walking into the dimly light hotel and discovering with shock its conversion into a hotel. Usha (glamourous introduction), who hears his voice comes down and ends up having an argument with him about how and why he left her.
Hari promises her of his unconditional love and Usha on her side keeps reminding him that it’s too late and that now she is his ‘anni’ (sister-in-law) and cannot satisfy his lust, despite Deep being dead. The arguments are however interrupted when the lights in the room begin flickering and Usha rushes a confused, troubled Hari to his room immediately.
While the others believe that the hotel is haunted by Deep’s ghost, Usha tries to keep Hari oblivious to it. However he soon finds out and rest of the play is all about how the inhabitants confront Deep’s ghostly tantrums naming everyone as Creative, Practical, Emotional, Moral and Total failures..
Unexpected revelations through the play added twist to the plot and made it more interesting.
In short – “what happens when a family hotel manager, two guests with peculiar connections to the past and a vengeful ghost turn up at the Midnight Hotel.”
This play written by author and playwright Shreekuma Varma, was first staged in 2009 directed by the veteran theatre director late Mithran Devanesan during when Victor Paulraj assumed the role of set and backstage manager who now turned as a directorial debut. The Madras Players – One of the oldest theatre company in India staged this drama.
Cast and Crew:
