When I decided to splurge 30 pounds on tickets for Miss Bollywood- the musical starring Shilpa Shetty - I did it for two reasons. One, of course, being the Hindi film buff that I am, I had to see Shilpa. And two- the show was being held at Royal Albert Hall- a place I have always wanted to visit ever since I heard that double cassette of ‘Lata Mangeshkar Live at Royal Albert Hall’ years and years ago. December 12, 2007 was the last show of this year after her tour all over Europe and the UK. And I was wondering if I had done the right thing, by choosing to spend an evening out when the weather forecast said minus two degrees Celsius.
Sometimes being over-punctual helps- I got there in time to see her up close addressing the press. Her mom accompanied her in a resplendant green silk saree. Well, I even managed to get between the press walas and listen to her talking about her being uncomfortable in a bikini, which is why she is not yet a Bond girl and how she wants to shop like crazy in London. She also talked about her new yoga DVD and pushed it hard. She is smart, talks well and carries herself very elegantly. Like an idiot I forgot my camera at home, and so you have to do with the grainy pictures from my mobile camera. She looked great like she does on screen, and the girls couldn’t help gushing about how gorgeous she looked. And then they were worried about how she would get dressed for the show which began at 7.30 pm when it was already 6.30 pm. They needn’t have worried- the show began at Indian Stretchable Time- at 8 pm.
While I was queuing up in front of the gate, I met two lovely English ladies who asked me if I was going to dance inside- while I demurely denied it. Turned out that they were huge Big Brother fans and had come to see someone ‘they absolutely loved’. Inside- the Royal Albert Hall was huge and the bright red decor was awesome.One day I will take the guided tour and give you more details. As I walked up to the third floor to my seat, I worried whether I will be able to see Shilpa from 3 floors up. Thank my lucky stars that I saw her so close, else I would be rueing my fate. In fact when the first dancers appeared on stage, we had half the audience whispering, ‘is it her, or isn’t it’! The more experienced ones had brought binoculars which were used effectively to look at pretty girls in the audience, who wore bigger dangling earrings than Shilpa, before the show started.
The show choreographed by Ganesh Hegde, is built around the story of Maya, a dancer who triumphs against all odds to perform at Trafalgar Square. And if you go there expecting Hegde’s choreography to be like one of those West End musicals- you will be thoroughly disappointed. For it is pure hard core Bollywood dance. For the first few minutes, I wondered if it was going to be anything better than a Annual Day function show in a decent school- for there wasn’t much meat in the script or songs. And the English parodies on Hindi film songs were ghastly- Ghaghra from Agra rhyming with abracadabra… ugh! It was amusing when Shilpa is rudely woken up from her reverie only to grumble, “Just when Richard Gere was about to kiss me!”
But you’ve got to hand it to Shetty for she had the audience lapping out of her hands- and by the end she raised the show to its crescendo with the audience dancing in the aisles. I was stuck somewhere in the middle seats- else I would have danced too! Well, after all there is no one in Bollywood who can execute perfect latka-jhatkas to the tunes of Kajrare, Beedi and Ishq Kameena in the manner Miss Shetty can! She was graceful, poised and fantastic when she danced.
But dancing aside, what struck me most was the manner in which Shilpa has emerged as a symbol of dignity to the Asian community here, fighting racism with courage. Even when they couldn’t decide whether to spell her name Che-tty or She-tty in their text messages, they admired her. In fact when she proclaimed that “life wasn’t always Goody-Goody” she had the maximum whoas of approval. In a country where the Asians complain that they are most disadvantaged as they are more educated, her fight back on national television brought to the forefront an issue that was usually undercovers. In my short stay here, I haven’t experienced it too much- except perhaps the occasional old British lady who would refuse to sit next to me in the tube, and prefer standing. But I did meet South Africans who said they had experienced apartheid, but it wasn’t so blatant in-the-face discrimination and rudeness as it is here. But when I asked them if they wanted to go back to their countries, they said no. For they couldn’t afford to get holidays in Europe if they went back! There must be something to this racism argument, for whenever someone on stage said ‘racist’ there was applause from the audience. And when they celebrated cultural diversity on stage, they made it a point to sink in that ‘tolerance’ and a ‘forgiving heart’ was unique to the immigrants from the subcontinent.
Well, I had a great time, listening to some wonderful music and watching some great dance. The light effects in the special sequence were marvellous. And as I walked out I had half a mind to give some sound bytes to the NDTV reporter who was waiting outside. But since I had to catch the tube I dropped the idea, only to discover that the gates to the only subway I knew in the area, were locked. But strangely at 11 pm that night, I wasn’t worried. For I was walking with 300 other ‘apne log’ all of whom spoke a language which was familiar and talked about themes which mattered to me. So I walked along with the crowd, and found the tube station without a problem, without asking for directions. And when the tube arrived, there were almost 50 Asians in that carriage- so comfortable in their togetherness, that the three English passengers in there literally cringed and shrivelled up. But then isn’t that what matters when you say, ‘us versus them’- the numbers. Strange, how the colour of one’s skin can make such a difference, when essentially we face the same problems along life as them.
