Writer : David Auburn Direction : Aditya Joshi Cast : Tamanna Mannan, Aditya Joshi, Bishakha Thapa & Kiran Patil
PROOF Review
Catherine (Preetika Chawla) is not a happy person and why would she be? It's her 25th birthday and her father Robert (Kashin Shetty), a celebrated mathematician at the University of Chicago, has just passed away after years of struggling with a mental illness. Her sister Claire (Prerna Chawla), who lives in New York has flown down for the funeral and manages to turn the wake into a college dorm-style party. And Harold Cobb (Ali Fazal), a pesky ex-student of her father's, keeps snooping around his old notebooks to find something that might be useful to the mathematical world. To make matters worse, we're told that Catherine hasn't just inherited her father's genius but possibly also his "madness".
PROOF, an Akvarious production, stars some of the company's regulars such as Prerna Chawla, Kashin Shetty (who also directed this play) and Akarsh Khurana himself in a small cameo as Melman, a math geek who sets fire to some shrimp at the wake. The play is written by American playwright David Auburn and is a celebrated 2001 Pulitzer Prize winner. Indeed, Akvarious has taken it on, made it its own and presented it with a flair that takes the audience on a journey through catharsis. The cast play their characters with conviction, though Preetika Chawla as Catherine stands out for her memorable portrayal as the disturbed and misunderstood young prodigy. The actor has taken the character's pain, anger and confusion and made it her own. Prerna Chawla does a fine job as usual as the older sister, Claire. While she has proved herself as a fine, energetic talent who can pull off comedy, PROOF gives her room to showcase her skills in serious drama.
Kashin Shetty directs this production and also plays the girls' father, Robert. He only appears in flashbacks and once in Catherine's imagination, but he really leaves a mark. As director he has definitely done a great job as the characters impeccably deliver their lines on cue. It's rare that one production company should produce so many winning stories in the same season, but Akvarious, known to be prolific, stands out as an exception. PROOF indeed has its audience intrigued from the word 'go'. This play was also part of Prithvi Theatre's Math Mela Month. Interspersed with brilliant lighting and a catchy soundtrack, it appeals to a mature audience, especially parents who sometimes tend to forget (for good reason) that they're loved unconditionally. But for most part it's a must watch for the youth, who don't realise that sometimes situations might compel you to give up your own dreams for the sake of your ailing parents.
