Khel Jari hai - Theatre Hub

This July Lahore saw some finest male actors come together and perform a theatrical masterpiece, “ Khel jari hai” for five consecutive days at Alhamra, hall2 under the banner of Theatre Hub.

The script was a translation of Rick abbot’s, “ Play on” which revolved around the chaos that happens during rehearsals  and how every time the actors progressed, the writer of the script came up and spoiled everything. 

I was lucky enough to see the script beforehand and I am glad the script was edited to suit the needs of the cast and audience. A lot of things that were missing in the script were brought to the audience in a beautiful way.

The whole idea of the play was to perform something within a performance. So every character was acting out two different characters.  It was a gamble when the director, Talal ali jan  agreed on this script. It would have been quite a flop if the actors wouldn’t have met the expectations to justify the script.

Amazingly, Lahore saw the Great Shah Fahad,  Spectacular Faheem muzaffar, Eice Khattana, Dawar Lashari ,Abuzar Farrukh Bilal Syed and Zain Qazi performing on one stage. If you follow the theatrical scene in Lahore I am sure when you would have come to know about the cast of Khel jari hai, you wouldn’t have thought twice before buying the ticket.

Theatre hub brought forward some new faces on the stage this year, Alee Hassan Shah and Daniyal Nasir who had an amazing stage presence and were able to create their own mark even though they were surrounded by well-established theatrical actors. Alee Hassan Shah was such a favorite of the crowd and is now working on his new project.

Alina Hamid ( Mona) , Minhail Zaman( Naveen) and Aniqa Mumtaz(Sana) were overshadowed by energetic male actors but they did know how to gracefully justify their characters to the audience. Each girl was wonderful and they have so much talent that am sure we would see them on the stage again.

I was wondering while watching the play that most probably the audience won’t be able to understand what’s going on because it was a play within a play but the actors kept the audience glued to the seats even though there were some parts that were a drag and could have been omitted.

The director knew about all these things and thus I am glad he added a live band that consisted of Ahsan Sohail, Muneeb, Hassan and Nauman. They were Outstanding! Eice khattana glamorous that he usually is in reality, did not fail to impress the audience with his drumming and acting. He surely knows how to make the audience go wild. Azeem Hamid choreographed dances in the play that were not only neat but also well performed by the actors. Dawar lashari was a blast of energy and with those curly hairs he knew how to set the stage on fire.

People who have seen the play would not fail to agree that the cast of Khel jari hai was superB in acting. I  am so glad that the play didn’t talk about political issues or revolutions but gave the audience a good entertainment in exchange for Rs.150.

They really need to put some money on the Play programs otherwise the stage looked fine. I wouldn’t have mind if they had more props around.  The set design was beautiful and very creative. Hats off to the creative head behind it. Lights were really good and so were the costumes. Ahmer zaman khan who was heading the production and also the marketing of the play. He looked pretty calm while walking on the steps of the hall. Theatre hub has managed to maintain a strong fan base now. There is nothing stopping them now. The play managed to have a house-full for three days and the rest days were  less crowded . However, The response of the audience has been favorable and not many have criticized it.
Moreover, I had seen Some untoward incident happening to  Aniqa Mumtaz ( sana) during her performance but hats off when she gave her best even though there she was hit by a fake pistol while performing.

Amazing work Theatre hub!

3.75/5