Lillete Dubey's play depicts lockdown woes with dash of humour

Chandigarh, September 24

Despite rain, city residents managed to reach Strawberry Fields High School here today to witness veteran actress and theatre director Lillete Dubey’s play, “Vodka & No Tonic”.

Supported by The Tribune and presented by The Durga Das Foundation, the five stories (read segments) had a common thread of Covid and lockdown apart from powerful stories of “Love Lost & Found” as they called it. While “Vodka & No Tonic” was performed by talented actress Ira Dubey, her mother, star performer Lillete, was kept hidden until the final segment “Lockdown Funeral”.

Actor Joy Sengupta paid due respect to the versatile actor in him in two separate stories – ‘A Quest Ends’ and ‘Leaving’. The latter was the only story performed in Hindi, which addressed the plight of a construction worker. The actor displayed his fluent language skills and shifted effortlessly from English to Bengali to Bhojpuri to Marathi as demanded the monologues during the acts.

The play continued for 100 minutes with 15-minute break in between after the third segment, “A Whiff of Eternity” performed by Ira Dubey where she plays a lesbian.

Post-break, the play turned more towards tragic tales reminding the lockdown woes, but also keeping the humour intact.

For the unversed, “Vodka & No Tonic” is based on stories from “Lockdown Liaisons” by bestselling writer Shobhaa De and is directed by Lillete Dubey. Beside lockdown, the central theme is love forgotten or rediscovered, which makes the audience relate to the characters at a deeper level.

The actress was impressed with city residents, who braved the weather to make her play a houseful. She said: “The city has never disappointed her in the past three decades.”