Different stories looped together with laughter and drama made the play 'California Suite', which was staged at the Alliance Francaise recently, stand out.
Put together by Playtonik Productions and Indianstage Performing Arts, 'California Suite' was a set of four hilarious and dramatic short plays, which had one thing in common —- Suite 203 and 204 of the Beverly Hills Hotel.
The storyline, comprising four different stories, included wit and humour to keep the audience on their seat's edge and was interspersed with a hint of reality too.
The four stories in the play were 'The Visitors from London', 'Visitor from New York', 'Visitor from Philadelphia' and 'Visitors from Chicago'. 'The Visitors from London' was a piece about a British actress Diana Nichols, who's a first-time nominee for the 'Academy Award for Best Actress', and her husband Sidney, an antique dealer who's indiscreet about his sexual orientation.
The Oscar is an honour that could put Diana back on the forefront, but she knows that she doesn't stand a chance. Being in denial about the true nature of her marriage, her mood wavers from being hopeful to panicky to desperate.
Businessman Marvin Michaels is the 'Visitor from Philadelphia', who wakes up in his hotel room to find a prostitute lying unconscious in his bed, after consuming too many drinks. All hell breaks loose, as he tries to 'clean up' before his wife reaches the suite. He has to find a way to conceal all traces of the episode, but finally gives in and confesses, seeing that he has no other way out.
In the 'Visitor from New York', a Manhattan editor Hannah Warren, flies to Los Angeles to take her teenage daughter Jenny back home, after Jenny leaves to live with her successful screenwriter father William. Despite the many years that they have been away, the duo's meeting is as cold as it can be, shifting shades from being sarcastic to cold to understanding. Hannah agrees to let Jenny stay for a while, on certain conditions.
The 'Visitors from Chicago' are two couples, who are best friends —- Stu, his wife Gert; and Mort, his wife Beth are taking a much-needed vacation together. Their difference of opinions, sarcasm, compatibility and togetherness is all tested, when they all fall into a series of accidents and mishaps.
The play, written by Neil Simon and directed by Deeban Chakravarthy and Imran Ahmed, was a combination of emotions like forgiveness, despair, hopefulness, companionship, and more. The cast — Roli Arun, KB Unni, Chetan A Rao, Ruchi Ravindran, Siddharth Kumar, Prarthana Prakash, Deepak Richard and Shweta Daga — performed their roles well.
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A plethora of emotions
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