“Do you act in the local theater?”, my company auditor asked me one day, out of the blue.
“Err…no. Why do you ask?”
“I saw this play recently. Six people seated, staring at the audience and pretending to be in…”
“Chatroom?”
“Yes, that’s the one.”
“I’ve heard of it although I couldn’t see it.”
“Ahh I see. You remind me of one of the actors. Can’t recall his name though…Aravind I think?”
“Arun?”
“Ahh that’s him. You remind me of him.”
“I see.”
I stopped before he dragged the conversation into the realms of the weird. That conversation took place after the first leg of Chatroom performances had concluded earlier this year. I wanted to see it then, but I either kept forgotting or had work related matters to attend to. Mr Auditor’s pretty feeble attempt at summarizing the plot though, strangely enough, made me hope that I’d get another chance to see the play. Tonight I had that chance and I am glad I took it.
Everyone and his grandfather should know the plot now so I won’t bore you with the details. The following is what I thought of it.
This being theater, acting becomes critical. In a movie, bad performances can be dusted under the carpet of brilliant special effects and assorted eye candy. Think Star Wars. In Chatroom, the performances fluctuated between the good in Arun’s case and the passable where the rest, minus Brandon, are concerned. Why was Brandon excluded, I hear you ask.
I define a brilliant actor as one who finds it physically impossible to lose the attention of the audience. No matter how small the role, how little he/she has to say, a brilliant actor is one who the audience will find difficult to forget. This is one of the reasons why I adore British comedy. No stars, just entire ensembles of brilliant actors. And Brandon is just that: a brilliant actor.
Yes, he had the most crucial role in the play – and consequently, the most attention from the audience – but it says a lot of an actor’s range when he can switch so effortlessly between understated comedy and painful psychological self-examination. His comic timing, by the way, was stellar and reminiscent of another brilliant actor in Guy Siner. I saw shades of Siner’s Lieutenant Hubert Gruber in Brandon’s performance. Apparently, he likes Allo Allo so I don’t know if it was indeed deliberate. Regardless, Brandon made the entire night unforgettable. Bravo, good sir. Bravo.
3 Comments
June 30, 2007 at 11:30 am
my head is the size of an air-baloon right now no doubt…
thank you so much… it means so much to me and the rest of the cast and crew to know that our hard work paid off.
like tracy said in her message, this was a run of faith and to know that we’ve not let our audience down with the faith they had in us is, that’s an achievement.
so thank you, from the bottom of my heart and i do hope the next production can be as kick-ass as this one…
June 30, 2007 at 9:19 pm
[...] and here and here’s what people said this time [...]
July 20, 2007 at 12:31 am
Chatroom? Never heard of it. I don’t even want to know.