Bits and pieces of fun

LAST THURSDAY, just a few minutes before 7 p.m., someone tells a grinning Deesh Mariwala, "Tell us when to laugh, Deesh."

An hour later, Deesh, temporarily disengaged from the happy environment, sits on the steps outside the British Council's auditorium talking about his "Bits and Pieces".

"It is a funny look at how people communicate," he says, summing up the evening ... a delightful reading of 10 five minute revue sketches that was handled ably by Michael Muthu, Indrani Krishnaier, Viniti Mahbubani and Deesh.

And yes, everyone in the predominantly young audience did laugh ... very spontaneously.

Fifty minutes of David Campton's single act revue sketches or "a loosely constructed theatrical show ..." had taken care of that.

But first, a bit about Campton.

He developed as a playwright with the Theatre in the Round at Scarborough, England, writing a number of plays, nearly all one- act, ranging from "domestic comedy, costume melodrama and the comedy of menace". His plays have rarely appeared in London with the result that he is little known. "Comedy of menace" is his coinage (from the subtitle of his play "The Lunatic View" (1957)) derived from the "Comedy of Manners".

* * *

"Bits and Pieces", that dwelt on the comedy inherent in relationships, began with "Gone". The setting - a park bench by twilight.

"You know, I'm gone on you," Dick tells Doris, "... Real gone."

Out looms Den and Dick realises that he has "got the wrong girl".

"You'd better be going all right," says Doris ... and then it is Den's turn to tell Doris that he has gone on her all right.

After "Asking" and "For the Present", it was "Gooseberry" that set the pace for the evening. Him (Deesh) has his arms around Her (Viniti) when ... he hiccoughs. The characteristic dialogue of single sentences moves from the point of getting a glass of water to what Charlie Perkins did when he had hiccoughs to Harry Foster to Willie Spence.

It is her turn now to have hiccoughs. "Glass of water?" he asks. "Please," she says. "Mable Bunce always used to ask for a glass of water," he says.

Here, it was Deesh's well-timed hiccoughs that fuelled the titters.

"Table Talk" ended the boyfriend-girlfriend pieces and marked the beginning of the married couple series.

Indrani as Edna and Michael as George unravelled the threads of a conversation around the dinner table. The piece ends with Edna being shot. "There's one pigeon that won't come after my peas," is George's grimly-satisfied statement.

Indrani was probably at her best here.

Pieces eight and nine - "Hunt Up" and "What a Name?" - led to "Volunteer".

George (Deesh) is trying to sleep while Mabel (Indrani) is up, listening to "a creak".

"I think we have a burglar," she says and George eventually goes out ... to return. "It was the people next door going to bed."

Given the dramatic structure of the sketches, it is the readers who either make or mar the show.

The verdict? A fine performance in every department.

MURALI N. KRISHNASWAMY

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