March 15,2022: Humour clan Bear Feet Comedy had its second outing at The Hive recently, with its focus being this very mad city, hence the title of the event, “The Mumbai Show”. A show that was to have funny men Aakash Mehta, Vikram Poddar and Bhavish Ailani as part of their roster, Kautuk Srivastav jumped into the fray too, but more on his set in a bit.
Aakash Mehta was the host for the event itself that celebrated and mocked the city and all it stands for. Mehta, although seeming a little harrowed at the beginning of the gig seemed to come right into his role of hosting, his constant improvisation and build up on material seeming to surprise even him from time to time. Stoner jokes seemed to be the essence to his jokes, and the audiences seemed to be rolling around in laughter throughout. Aakash also did a good number of jokes on the city itself, ranging from living at Grant Road to the many traffic and train pangs of people living all over the city. His set was divided over 4 sections, interspersed with the othr comedians’ performances.
Vikram Poddar was the next comedian to take stage. Poddar’s set was one laced heavily with not only incidents from memory, but also one that traveled down the realm of his imagination. While his jokes ranged from Harbour Line trains being the most absurd of train lines to imageries of HR execs handling the July 26 floods, and his set was entertaining at most times, what was a dampener was how short his set was: while all of the other comics delivered good long 10-15 minute sets, his was barely eight minutes long. Too bad, since his material was very interesting.
Kautuk Srivastava was the surprise add-on to the three man line-up for the evening and a good surprise it was- Srivastava has this ability to convert his Bihari-living-in-Mumbai piece into so many different manifestations all the time. His jokes on how you could spot Biharis in the city left the audience in splits, his observation of a Bihari’s back being different showing a good skill of joke-writing, and what was very commendable about his set was the number of quick-witted jokes that Srivastava kept delivering.
Bhavish Ailani was the final comic for the night. For a comic who is known to keep audiences in absolute splits, Ailani did not seem to be in his natural comfort zone, a place you would see him normally on stage. While there is no doubt that Ailani’s prepared material as well as improv were both in place, Ailani made sure he interacted with the audiences well too. However, misplaced concentration seemed to have taken a toll on him, with quite a few lapses in terms in of delivery. While Ailani also delivered a set that evoked much laughter in a short period of time, again it would have been awesome to have a longer set that concentrated on Mumbai and its people and the profound effect it has had on him.
All in all, it The Mumbai Show was a good comedy show, with plenty of laughter going all around. One observation, however, that was also made of multiple comedians at The Mumbai Show was them keeping looking at their notes while performing. A bad show of unpreparedness, while it is something you could expect at an Open Mic event, doing the same at a dedicated show kinda beats the purpose of having a show of the sort.
Pictures: Sushant Sawant Photography
For more pics from the gig, click here.
