Need Junoon for song-dance drama

It is indeed passion that takes us to our goals. Thus, the title of the musical series, ‘Hai Junoon!’, is just apt. But more than the name of the series, we need to pay heed to its tagline: ‘Dream. Dare. Dominate.’ It’s important to both dream and dare, but where can the will to dominate take us?

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When the musical ‘Bandish Bandits’ landed on our screens, it was indeed a breath of fresh air, for it celebrated music in its entirety, especially the sonorous notes of shastriya sangeet. One can’t say Jio Creative Studios’ ‘Hai Junoon!’ walking the musical path is a rip-off. Rather, instead of playing on the rivalry of musical groups or different genres, it starts off as a class divide of sorts. And thus pitches off the college’s musical band, Supersonics, against a dance group, which later finds its name: Misfits.

Supersonics is the college’s favourite, patronised first by a teacher, Professor Iyer (Boman Irani), and later by a renowned singer, Gagan Ahuja (Neil Nitin Mukesh), an alumnus of the college. The lead dancer of Misfits, Subhash Mhatre, is a product of a chawl who has secured admission in this elitist college on a quota. He and his motley group of friends neither get the stage, nor any backers. They rely on flash mob appearance to gain visibility. But what is an artist without a stage? So, he sets out to find one. The challenges he encounters are not unusual. Though why a college which goes an extra mile to promote one discipline of art would shut its eye to another form is perplexing. Of course, cold logic can’t be applied to the world of entertainment.

Interestingly, the writers (Ankit K Sharma, Vivian Chettiar, Rajdeep Ghosh) take extra pains to create a contemporary slice of college life and throw in heavy duty words like mansplaining, touche and pansexuality. Of course, when the series itself talks of ‘tokenism’, you have this strange feeling that they are trying to duck the blame, before they are accused of the same. For, apart from the usual array of characters from various classes, they make space for the physically challenged and people with alternate sexuality too. To be fair, they do normalise their presence in the storyline. The problem is that the series, which is essentially meant to be a song and dance bonanza, soon turns to be too serious an affair.

As it is, the long format of story-telling does demand a battery of characters and often their backstories too. It’s a crowded place in any case. There is Bikram (Siddharth Nigam) from Jalandhar who wants to be Sonu Nigam; a girl who falls into the pretend trap; yet another pretty one who has self-worth issues. Expectedly, it becomes difficult to feel for each one of them. If you pack the drama with innumerable issues from fat-shaming to anxiety, besides the usual problems of competitiveness, it would turn into a classic case of biting more than one can chew. Nevertheless, actors do not make mincemeat of the parts assigned to them, and remain in fine form.

Boman Irani shines in his cameo as only an actor of his class and mettle can even in a brief part. Neil Nitin Mukesh as Gagan finally gets the role that becomes him. Among others, Sumedh Mudgalkar as Subhash Mhatre, an upstart mentor and lead dancer of Misfits, has the necessary swag. Priyank Sharma as Kushal makes his gay character rather endearing. Ditto for Siddharth Nigam. He carries the innocence of a small-town boy caught in the trappings of city of dreams Mumbai.

Jacqueline Fernandez as Pearl Saldhana, who lands a job in the college courtesy her tempestuous past and well-connected father, too, acts well. She gets a significant dialogue — “manzil pe nazar rakho, raste ki distractions pe nahi”. Wish the series had been more focused and just confined itself to making us shake a leg with a song on our lips.

By the way, Shankar Mahadevan, who has composed the soundtrack of the series, gets an ode, too, with ‘Breathless’ finding due mention. He makes an appearance too.

Breaking the 20-episode series into two seasons or compressing it into lesser episodes would have been a smart idea. As the series itself tells us, “Success is most times not driven by talent alone, but the choices talent makes.” Still, the passion behind the making of ‘Hai Junoon’ makes it more than watchable.