In Avneesh Mishra’s The Morning Show, small-town childhoods shape big conversations on gender and violence

The rape of a young teenage girl, Guddi, by a bunch of schoolboys is at the core of Mishra’s play that draws a striking parallel between the beating of rag-doll gudiyas and the sexual violence inflicted on a flesh-and-blood Guddi. “The rapists are misguided youth growing up in an atmosphere of suppression, confused about the hormonal changes taking place within them. With both, parents and school teachers, fighting shy of explaining biological issues to them, the befuddled youth get attracted to the wrong influences,” reasons Mishra, not to justify their condemnable acts, but to understand where they come from.

One of the wrong influences in Mishra’s play is a peddler of porn, Madan Chaacha, a despicable, flashy character, portrayed very convincingly by Naveen Rody, who lures vulnerable schoolboys to morning shows where explicit sexual scenes are inserted in regular Hindi films. Thereafter, he plays mentor and guide to the sexually-aroused youngsters, encouraging them to force their machismo on girls. “Don’t get dissuaded when girls say ‘No’. Secretly, they too want what you want. Why would they be painting their lips if they didn’t want to attract you?” is his stereotypically flawed logic. But, to young, impressionable minds, what he says makes sense.

Still from Avneesh Mishra’s The Morning Show

“Where I grew up even friendly interaction between girls and boys was considered taboo,” continues Mishra. “So much was left to the imagination about the opposite sex that it was easy for the Madan chaachas to fill in the blanks with distorted advice.

“Some popular, untampered Hindi films, too, fired the minds of clueless youngsters in an adverse manner. While many of the films of the 1960s-70s had graphic rape scenes by villains, in the 1990s some of the films had, shockingly, star-actors propagating toxic ideas of masculinity through the characters they played. All this had a terrible impact on immature minds.”

Mishra’s play places the onus of teenage sexual crime squarely on society, at large, and the blinkered upbringing of children. “If boys and girls were allowed to mix freely and be friends sharing common interests, they would understand and respect one another without looking at the opposite sex only through the physical lens,” elaborates Mishra. “Instead of skirting the issue, if parents, teachers, counsellors, legal, religious and law-enforcing bodies had open discussions with youngsters about gender, it would go a long way in broadening small-town mentalities and clearing the confusion of adolescents,” he adds.

Illustrating this line of thinking, The Morning Show contrasts the unhealthy relationships of repressed youngsters with a budding, equitable friendship between Ashok, hailing from an ultra- conservative family, and Maya from a liberal, educated background. Played candidly and sensitively by Aditya Ghosh and Aashi Tripathi, products of Rangshila Theatre Group’s acting workshop, Ashok and Maya have animated conversations about painting and poetry. But when Ashok, prompted by his wayward friends, makes an overture of physical intimacy to the sensible Maya, she walks away from his unwanted move, telling him, “Jism choone se pehle dil ko choona padta hai.”

Another still from Avneesh Mishra’s The Morning Show

A bold play, which will next be staged at the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre, Mumbai, on February 15, The Morning Show discusses, threadbare, adolescent pangs, provincial gender equations and the harmful effects of patriarchy on young girls and boys.