Play review/ One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest

BY NARENDRA KUSNUR 

One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest/ English play

Directed by: Danesh AR Khambata

Producers: INT Aditya Birla Centre For The Performing Arts and Silly Point Productions

Writers; Ken Kesey (novel), Dale Wasserman (for stage)

Cast: Zafar Karachiwala, Anahita Uberoi, Sohrab Ardeshir, Joy Fernandes, Deven Khote, Sufiyan Junaid, Gillian Pinto, Digvijay Savant, Varun Narayan

Rating: ****

(This blogger saw the play at Tata Theatre, Nariman Point, on June 28. Details on more shows in Mumbai on social media of producers).

When nobody's around, Chief Bromden has conversations with his dead 'Papa'. Otherwise, the Native American Indian spends all his time sweeping the floor, and those around him ignore him for being deaf and dumb.

'Chief', played by Joy Fernandes, is one of the inmates in the mental institution featured in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, the play based on Ken Kesey's 1962 novel of the same name. He and his companions are under the strict supervision of Nurse Rathched (Anahita Uberoi), and things take a turn when Randle McMurphy (Zafar Karachiwala) is admitted after feigning mental illness when he was accused of raping a 15-year-old who he claims is 18.

'One Flew' was first adapted as a play in 1963 by Dale Wasserman, and the first Broadway run featured the legendary Kirk Douglas as McMurphy. Later, Jack Nicholson made that role famous in Milos Forman's 1975 film version. Now, it comes to India under the direction of Danesh A.R. Khambata, who sticks to the original script and characters.

In a nutshell, it's one of those plays which causes empathy as much as it generates humour. The text is such that the audience is regularly chuckling at the subtle jokes but at the same time feeling sad about the circumstances and behaviour of the institution's inmates. Though this story is set and written in an American environment over six decades ago, and research studies on mental health are far more advanced and precise today, the basic symptoms and personality traits of patients remain the same.

McMurphy and 'Chief' are thus surrounded by people with different quirks. One is obsessed with his card games, one is standing in the same position for hours with his hands raised parallel to the ground, one suffers from a peculiar sexual problem which has affected his mental faculties.

Like any institution, this one has rules, and while Nurse Ratched is responsible for imposing them, McMurphy is hellbent on breaking them. He has bets with his new friends, gets in a shady woman Candy (played by Gillian Pinto), tries to befriend the doctor John Spivey (Digvijay Savant), organises a secret party and even attacks the nurse by grabbing her throat.

For all his actions, McMurphy is made to undergo a lobotomy, a neurosurgical process that involves severing connections to the brain. And then there's that dramatic turn in the plot which leaves a lump in the throat.

What's noteworthy is that each actor has put in a brilliant performance. The list of main actors is mentioned in the credits above. Unlike the film, where one could shift the location and camera angles, this one has a fixed set (picture below). The way each actor does different things at the same time is well-captured.

To be sure, the 110-minute play takes time to pick up in the first half, and one lengthy post-intermission interaction between McMurphy and 'Chief' could have been shortened. But there's plenty to make up for in terms of delivery and impact. If there's that one 'wow' moment that will stay etched in the audience's mind, it's that part where the patients have been denied permission to change the institution's TV-watching timings so that they can watch a football championship, and McMurphy goads the others into watching an imaginary match. It's theatre at its best, perfectly imagined, perfectly executed.

(Pic credits; Top picture from Instagram page of Silly Point Productions. Bottom picture taken by blogger at Tata Theatre).