‘Run For Your Wife’ with Indu Dharmasena

 By Shiran Illanperuma

Remembering your lines is a lot harder when you’re not the one writing them, muses a sheepish Indu Dharmasena.

The veteran playwright has been – if anything – prolific. Having written and directed over 64 plays over the course of his startling career, taking on the script of renowned playwright Ray Cooney is a bit of a change of pace for the enigmatic Indu.

“Because I always write my own plays I don’t get to do this sort of thing very often. I’ve acted in Ray Cooney plays before but this is the first time I’m directing one,” he says.

A fan of Cooney’s work, Indu says that at least six of the plays he has written were informed by Cooney’s distinctive style, “in real time, as the action happens”.

Dharmasena’s actors and frequent collaborators are playfully smug about their director’s forgetfulness and the banter flows easily on a balmy evening at Indu’s house in Battaramulla. 

Note-heavy scripts in hand during a rehearsal session at his Battaramulla home, Indu and his cast exchange lines as they channel Cooney’s comic characters.

Indu’s production of ‘Run For Your Wife’ by Ray Cooney is at the behest of the Rotary Club of Colombo, which approached the comedic director to tackle the play after procuring the rights.

‘Run For Your Wife’ has been performed for Sri Lankan audiences before of course, twice by playwright Mohamed Adamaly who also went on to direct the sequel. “It was done well,” says Indu recalling Ali’s production fondly.

He recalls that some people have attempted to localise or modernise the play already, but Indu says his take on the play will be straight and faithful. 

Indu’s fidelity to Cooney’s highly descriptive script is one that he hardly reserves for his owns plays, which he admits to updating and revamping on the regular.

But as for ‘Run For Your Wife,’ he says, “Actually you can’t do anything different without radically changing the script.”

‘Run For Your Wife’ is about John Smith, a taxi driver who has two wives who don’t know about each other. The man attempts to rescue and old lady from being mugged but is assaulted by her instead and is subsequently hospitalised. When in hospital the man gives one home address to the police and another address to the doctors.

“Clearly it’s a plot device that requires a suspension of disbelief. The fact that he can’t get to a phone to inform his wives of his situation is so central but this is especially improbable in the modern world with Facebook and texts and the internet,” he says with a chuckle.

One of Indu’s actors, Michelle Herft, who plays the sultrier of John Smith’s two wives, chimes in. “It’s actually quite appalling, a man having two wives and leading them on. But this morally unjust situation is made fun with Cooney’s fast-paced script and Indu’s direction.”

With rehearsals stretching out into the night, as the cast gets comfortable in the skin of their characters, Indu looks forward to portraying the average Joe cum rogue that is John Smith. “I’ve played a lot of characters in my time and bits of them many of them can be found in John.”

Indu Dharmasena’s production of ‘Run For Your Wife’ will go on the boards at the Lionel Wendt Theatre on 19, 20 and 21 February at 7:30 p.m.

Pix by Bhanuka Kirinde

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