CHURNING OUT LAUGH RIOTS

Ashleshaa Khurana

Leaving Surtis hysterical with humorous performances, The Comedy Factory team made its debut in Surat last Saturday. The audience bent over their belly buttons laughing till they cried watching and listening to the first ever stand –up comedy show in Tapi town of quality calibre.

Brainchild of Manan Desai – an ace performer of dead pan humour , an intelligent mind with a poker straight face, The Comedy Factory renowned for its insanity around Gujarat found new fan following for their playful and mischievous dialogue while shooting down hilarious point bullets at existential and metaphorical buzzing bugs of present day topics. Team member Ojas Rawal, the specialist at researching local flavour focused on food and human behaviour encapsulating it brilliantly with the culmination of western and Indian mannerisms.

In for a funny treat, Surtis had the added advantage to watch winner of CEO’s Got Talent- Atul Khatri at what he does best-make people laugh. He found Surat’s audience as receptive as that of Bombay,Delhi and Bangalore. Amidst unending claps and whistles, he rendered dirty-hairy jokes about Sindhis, snack –shop tourism of Gujaratis and issues over toilet tissues. Weaving audience participation within his pieces to make them even more live wire. This CEO of a computer company, who found his calling in stand up comedy and has been short listed as one of the country’s most promising artists at that, Khatri said ,” I actually suffered from stage fright as a kid and although was never trained for this began it to make life spicier and increase my own confidence. It requires real guts. On stage one is up there, alone and knows he has to deliver the value of the audience’s money, engage them in an interaction, and ensure that the risky material in a joke does not offend, even though it is always at someone’s expense. Stand up comedians perceive even serious problems differently, with unique presentation. Within 30 – 35 minutes they begin strong, keep up the fizz and end with a grand high.”

Ace of The Comedy Factory base -Smit Pandya won the audience applause and hearts with his desi flavoured fun takes. Spontaneous, free spirited, the clarity of his diction and voice modulation match up to that of Paresh Rawal. Pandya a theatre artist since the age of 11 is a lecturer and his Masters degree of Social work along with his mirth has helped him save three suicidal youngsters. With thousands of clicks on his Youtube performances, he makes sure his acts do not get monotonous.” Stand up comedians intertwine current topics into acts so that audiences can identify with them. We constantly upgrade ourselves to lift the genre and quality of entertainment. Manan and me have therefore begun the ‘Improv comedy ‘acts  .”

Managing director Vidya Desai points out that while profits are not the main motive, “The Comedy Factory is a platform where artists from all over India unite to bring a cosmopolitan flavour of English and regional comedy ,social and political issues, and acceptable adult content to the audience.”

Event partner Prakash Hathi said,”I have seen few things in life are better in actuality than on screen –this was one such event. Extracting humour out of everything, the way these guys connected with business minded Surtis was amazing.”

Freelance media consultant Hetvi Choksi said,”Am not a stand- up comedy lover and was forced to attend by a friend but I enjoyed it to the extent that my jaws were hurting post the show. I haven’t laughed so much in a live event and am looking forward to more in future.