Right before the start of director M Sayeed Alam’s satirical comedy Ghalib in New Delhi, the hall authorities greet you with the phrase ’Have a good laugh!’. Unsure of what follows next, the audience—there were more than a hundred viewers seated at the LTG Auditorium, Mandi House, on Sunday evening—waited for the magic to unfold. The next 120-minutes turned the aforementioned phrase into reality.
Since Ghalib in New Delhi’s first show in 1997, Alam—he has co-written and co-directed the play with playwright Mrinal Mathur—and his team have performed at Pierrot’s Troupe this Hindi-Urdu play over 530 performances, making it one of India’s longest running comedies. Sunday’s performance was yet another successful presentation of this rip-roaring play that is centred on the rebirth 18th Century Urdu poet Mirza Ghalib in his beloved city Delhi.
Shedding light on the journey of this comedy, Alam shared, “The structure of the play is pretty much the same since the beginning, though we have deleted many scenes. But, with time, the play has evolved. In every show, we make modifications. If there is something going around us, we try to talk about it in the play as well. The play isn’t static, which is also the reason behind its success.”
A satirical turn of events
Ghalib in New Delhi forays into the incongruous entry of the poet into the 21st Century, stirring a wave of madness. Over a course of encounters with a number of characters that are rooted in Delhi’s linguistic and cultural practices, we witness Ghalib’s transition into a true ‘Dilliwala’ and a Page 3 celebrity. Conflicts arise from the absurdity of the situation as well as the underlying politics of both language and history that the contrasting characters bring to the stage. The satirical play is loaded with key political references—these are incidents related to Punjab and Uttar Pradesh elections or even Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, among others—and utilises farcical elements to keep the energy high while keeping the audience hooked.
Beyond its victorious comedic elements, Ghalib in New Delhi is also an absorbing reflection of our times. The quintessential characters, each with a strong stage presence, bring a unique persona to the stage. Alam’s impeccable portrayal of the central character Ghalib is an unmissable treat and the supporting cast also fared well to match the director/actor’s skill that is rooted in years of experience. Sumit Bhardwaj, who played the role of sharabi (a drunkard) quite convincingly, shared, “Comedy is difficult. Making your audience cry is easy but making them laugh is a challenge. But, when you have someone like him [Alam] with you, anything is possible. The obvious challenge was to play drunk without actually being drunk (laughs) but I am very grateful that sir [Alam] gave me a chance to play this role.”
After years of showcasing this play, Ghalib in New Delhi has achieved what most stage productions are unable to: audience participation. Given the way it adopted physical comedy with the psychology of a farce, the performers were successful in breaking the fourth wall, giving the audience a space to participate. For instance, at a number of instances Ghalib would begin narrating a sher (couplet) and wait for the audience to complete, a trope that kept the audience engaged until the end. Atul Bhardwaj, who came to watch the play from Sarita Vihar, concluded, “The play was hilarious. I loved the fact that they incorporated current affairs in their dialogues; that was the highlight for me.”