Where There is a Will by Mahesh Dattani
Directed by Mitran Devanesan
Madras Music Academy, July 20, 2002.

Mahesh Dattani, the celebrated Indian playwright, could not keep his date in Toronto in 2001. Following the famous dictum, if Mohammed… we followed him to Chennai in 2002 and were treated to a polished performance of his first play, “Where There is a Will.”

Mitran Devanesan of Madras Players collected a coterie of his regular actors and presented Dattani to a receptive Chennai audience. Our readers would remember the profile of Devanesan published in Kală a few years ago. Devanesan is known for his creative set designs as well as presenting English plays with local colour. His sets for Dattani’s play are no different. The play is set within the confines of four rooms (two bed rooms, the living room and the de rigueur dining room). Devanesan divided the cavernous stage of the Music Academy to create these four rooms. Each room is imbued with the pointed details to set the tone for the play.

Through a simple scheme of a Will, convoluted to say the least, the relationships between the four main protagonists of a joint family are painfully wrought. It is clear from the outset that the humour of the play is sheathed in black comedy and the overtones of Ibsenesque strangulation are the main tools of Dattani.

The story is simple at best. It revolves around a supposedly self-made industrialist, Hasmukh Mehta (Sudhir Ahuja) with the typical problems of family, wife Sonal (Kaveri Lalchand), wastrel of a son Ajit (Karthik Srinivasan), wily daughter-in-law Preethi (Shweta Ravishankar) and mistress Kiran Jhaveri (Sheetal Govindan). Each of the four belies their names. Hasmukh is not a smiling face and Sonal is tarnished at best. Ajit is not victorious, at least in his father’s eyes, and Preethi has no love lost between the rest and her. It is a wonder that such allegiances actually take place. The dour Hasmukh decides to play a trick on his family. He leaves his entire assets to a trust to be managed by his mistress, Kiran, for a minimum of 21 years when his prodigal son would be 48. The wealth at that time would be of little use to his oldwife, spent son and daughter-in-law. They would have to put up with the mistress for as per the Will, Jhaveri has to live in the same house for the said period. How vengeful can one get?

The play is neatly divided into two halves, pre-death Hasmukh and post-death Hasmukh. Hasmukh is ever present throughout the play, even as a ghost in the second half. The first half sets the stage for the later shenanigans. The sour relationship between the two couples is developed in elaborate vignettes. Ahuja and Lalchand were natural in their roles as a sexless and loveless couple engaged in a typical middle-class millieu. Devanesan setting for their bedroom (two single beds) is a clear indication of this forced relationship. The wiliness of Preethi is evident in her eager anticipation of his death. Dattani’s wicked humour is at its best in the first half. One actually awaits the tragic denouement of the second half.

The second half is problematic at best. After spending enormous efforts to develop the two couples in the first half, the second half loses momentum, as Dattani seems to be in a hurry to conclude. Kiran Jhaveri was not developed fully, as comic asides seem to take over the denouement. May be it is lack of direction or the inability of Govindan to fill the shoes of a tough part. She seems to have been a last minute fill-in and it shows, as Govindan kept forgetting her lines. Instead of complimenting Sonal, Kiran was wooden at best even during her moments of victory. We learnt that this was Dattani’s first play and perhaps he has not yet honed his skills completely. However, Ahuja and Llachand made up for the poor second half with their consummate acting throughout.