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Plays tend to teach you how to watch them within the first five minutes.
The good ones do it deliberately, the not-so-good ones less so.
The fiction writer Rob Spillman calls it the handshake.
(Chowdhury also directs the production.)
Theyre discussing film directors from theBengali neorealist movement, specifically Subrata Sen and Satyajit Ray.
Sen is not so artistic I think, says Pishe, Chotons uncle, between bites of sweets.
Tai na?Not like Ray.
Raheem considers: I guess I kind of feel like Sens films are more … painterly than … … That kind of like … slice of life, super-naturalistic.
Pishe nods, munching.
See, for Ray, this is realitytoh.
He is showing the reality of the life in Bengal.
Chowdhury, as both playwright and director, has introduced himself.
In this meticulously rendered middle-class Bengali home, the characters ofPublic Obscenitieswont howl and grandstand.
They wont soliloquize or strut or be shattered by a devastating third-act reveal.
They will simply live.
Except, of course, livings not simple at all.
Hes got the quiet attention and the quick politeness of a respectful guest (Good boy!
No screens on the windows, no doors to the rooms only curtains and mosquito netting and open air.
If everywhere is public, is all intimacy, all nonnormative behavior, suddenly obscene?
Raheem is embarrassed, yes, but hes mostly upset for so embarrassing Jitesh.
Ive told him a million times, he snaps, just, like … knock.
Chotons eyes are wide open to certain identities and injustices but blind to others.
He can wax progressive on gender and sexuality while casually embodying the long legacy of caste.
I need a minute, he manages to get out.
Im gonna go for a walk.
After all, the DP has walked out.
Where do we look now?
How do we frame things?
Without Raheem, we lose perspective.
Chowdhurys not giving us a lecture on the courage and solidarity of Indias diverse gender-nonconforming community.
Hes just letting his characters be.
Im a simple person.
Raheem spends most of the play with an old Rolleicord camera around his neck.
It belonged to Chotons grandfather, Pishimonis father, whom she still reveres.
Chowdhury could push this unit toward melodramatic revelation.
Again, he holds back.
Some things refuse to be translated.
Public Obscenitiesis at Theatre for a New Audience through February 25.
