Anu Vaidyanathan chooses her comedy favourites

Edinburgh Fringe comedian Anu Vaidyanathan chooses her Perfect Playlist of comedy favourites.

Never Have I Ever

This masterpiece produced by Mindy Kaling is possibly the first show I binge-watched. Until then, I was quite picky about what I watched on the streamers but that show opened several floodgates.

I’ve been studying, working, living away from home since the age of 16. The Tamil women I grew up around are super witty and unafraid to show it. To watch a character like my younger self, living in a traditional-yet-curious south Indian household was refreshing. 

Everyone in Never Have I Ever, has a distinct place in my heart. Nirmala, Nalini and Devi Vishwakumar (played by Ranjita Chakravarthy, Poorna Jagannathan and Maitreyi Ramakrishnan) represent the three generations of women in my own household and the polysyllabic challenges we present to the world. With just the spelling of our names.

Devi Vishwakumar’s love interests are hilarious and rooted in the shame, exhilaration and sometime ambivalence one feels when one is a brown girl aged between 18 and 25 dating those who are slightly paler. My favourite parts are the friendships between Devi, Fabiola (Lee Rodriguez) and Margot (Victoria Morales). It brought back sitting in a class on Milton’s poetry while majoring in electrical engineering and finding myself way out of my depth. 

What makes life bearable are the friends you choose and the bright spots in the family you don’t – Never Have I Ever is the complete South Indian thaali (a plate of assorted foods in small portions). And it celebrates nerds who make you laugh. Never Have I Ever thought that was all right!

Kosmo Kramer

…and why he’s Tamilian

Being a nerd, whose only meal ticket was academic scholarships, I discovered Kosmo Kramer between two degrees. My fine friends from the poetry classes pursuing the liberal arts had managed to convince me that being paid half the salary of my male peers in engineering was not acceptable. In an act of regrettable rebellion, I quit my research position and changed majors to geography. Where men and women were paid equally but half the salary of women in engineering. 

I discovered Kramer’s truism about dreaming in 3D, which happens when one is really hungry. Especially at the end of the month. When the stipend and the weekly loan from my engineering friends had been spent. It was on one of those nights that I concluded Kramer is of Tamil origin. He said ‘You ever dream in 3D? It feels like the Bogeyman is coming right at you.’

Later in life, when subscribing after four decades to the temples of lipstick and personal grooming, to distract from the fact that I could not fit into my pre-partum pants, I discovered another gem where Kramer goes: ‘Jerry, my face is my livelihood, my allure… my twinkle.’ And concluded that lipstick was a fine distraction technique for bad-hair and ill-fitting days.

A Fish Called Wanda

 As a filmmaker dreaming of making a comedy feature, I feel extreme jealousy when looking at the casting of A Fish called Wanda. If there be anything called perfect casting, this film would have to take the prize.

My favourite was of course Ken Pile played by the brilliant Michael Palin. Not only does Palin have genius timing and talent but he also had a love-affair with travel and Jules Verne in his other television work.

 Studying the work of this (now) famous ensemble is also a masterclass in performance. Kevin Kline as Otto, in contrast to his portrayal of Nathan Landau in Sophie’s Choice, is the calibre of actor one can only dream of directing. Someday. When South Indians are finally acknowledged to spell better than most. 

Mozhi

One of the most annoying pieces of feedback on scripts (written by Indians and reviewed by non-Indians) is there are far too many characters, without paying heed to differences in dramaturgy, language and such. 

When confronted with such feedback, I often point at this comedy film in Tamil titled Mozhi. There are at least a dozen talking heads, which is the minimum number of characters any good scene needs. More seriously, Mozhi is about two unmarried men who move into a high-rise to play idiots, saviours and musicians whose natural rhythm seems to be laughter, or laughter-inducing antics. 

With the leads Prithviraj Sukumaran, Prakash Raj and the brilliant Jyothika, whose eyes do most of the talking (as she plays a deaf-mute), I started to give myself permission to write stand out scripts when dreaming in Tamil and writing in English.

The director, Radha Mohan, happened to be one in a line of fantastic (Tamil) comedy directors including Singeetam Srinivasa Rao, K.S Ravikumar and Visu. Whose full name was Meenakshisundaram Ramasamy Viswanathan. As if South Indians could ever be monosyllabic. That would be a misnomer. As for too many characters, that many notes is what makes the music more soulful, complex and complete. 

• Anu Vaidyanathan: BC:AD – Before Children, After Diapers is at the Gilded Balloon Patter House at 3.40pm during the Edinburgh Fringe.

Published: 11 Aug 2024