In Nandita Das' Zwigato Kapil Sharma finally makes the grade as an actor

Nandita Das ’ latest directorial project Zwigato , produced by the indefatigably enterprising Applause Entertainment, features the most unlikely delivery boy you will ever get to meet. Kapil Sharma plays a workless product of the post-pandemic recession. He is Manas, a factory manager who loses his job during the pandemic and must now make ends meet as a food delivery boy.

I don’t know how Nandita thought of Kapil Sharma in this character. I would think Nawazuddin Siddiqui who played Saadat Hassan Manto in Nandita’s biopic, would ace the role. Trust Nandita to always spring a surprise. The heartwarming trailer of Zwigato shows Kapil fully into character. This is the first time he gets his big-screen presence right. His earlier forays into filmdom were pretty dumb.

In Zwigato, he looks every inch the friendly neighbourhood delivery boy. The kind that gets screamed at for arriving a few minutes late. Nandita went through many acting workshops with Kapil to drive in the difference between the body language used during standup acts on stage and that of a delivery boy. Throughout the trailer, we see Kapil not playing a variation of himself from his popular comedy show but a real delivery boy.

The brilliant self-effacing Shahana Goswami plays Kapil’s supportive wife. It’s truly heartwarming to see the couple standing by one another to make ends meet. While Kapil’s Manas is one of the many jobless faces that have emerged from the pandemic, Kapil doesn’t play the character as a stereotype. From the trailer, Kapil seems to have breathed life into his character.

The trailer shows him zigzagging expertly through the lanes and busy streets on his moped trying to deliver the food on time. As someone points out to him, Manas’ life is nothing but a relentless pursuit of ‘selfies’ and ‘incentives’.

There is not much of that, incentive, at home as his daughter asks why he can’t be doing some other job. Think about it from the girl’s point of view: imagine telling your friends your father is a delivery boy.

From the trailer, it appears as though Zwigato will be Kapil’s way forward as a populist entertainer. Nandita has harnessed his popularity as a hero of the masses, the working-class entertainer to great advantage.

In Zwigato, Kapil Sharma reminds us of Amol Palekar in Basu Chatterjee ’s cinema. After two very dark directorials, Firaaq (2008) and Manto (2018) Nandita Das attempts a much lighter shade in Zwigato. Not that she is looking for laughter in the delivery boy’s tale. But she is in search of a spot of sunshine in one of the many lives which lost their bearings in the pandemic.

A shout-out to Applause Entertainment for backing Nandita Das’s working class romcom. We need more relatable working-class dramas.

Subhash K Jha is a Patna-based film critic who has been writing about Bollywood for long enough to know the industry inside out. He tweets at @SubhashK_Jha.

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