Zaittun Esmail, Sugith Varughese, Nimet Kanji, Sharjil Rasool, Bren Eastcott, Vijay Mehta and Parm Soor in ‘The Wrong Bashir’, Photo by Dahlia Katz
Ken Mackenzie’s wide and detailed set is a quietly impressive spectacle. Your eyes are pulled through the layout, decor and hints of clutter that make the Ladha home feel authentic. This realism is essential, grounding us in a tangible, lived-in quality that allows the performances to go so broad without breaking the immersion. The Wrong Bashir, presented by Crow’s Theatre, is playwright Zahida Rahemtulla’s ambitious, nine-character comedy that offers an amusing and heartfelt portrait of a Toronto Ismaili community.
The titular Bashir (Sharjil Rasool)—there are two Bashir Ladhas in the story (the frequency of identical names and the resulting confusion is a running joke)—is a wayward college student who has had to move back home, furtively coming and going from the attic of the family home. A philosophy major, the only thing he’s got going on is his “analogue podcast” about “nihilism, existentialism and new ageism.” He records the episodes on cassette tapes and distributes them to cafes in a boom box because the internet is too mainstream. Insufferable? Certainly. But also undeniably eccentric and sort of endearing.
The story is set in motion by his parents—father Sultan (Sugith Varughese) and mother Najma (Nimet Kanji)—accepting on his behalf a student-focused religious position he is entirely unqualified for. His sister Nafisa (Bren Eastcott) becomes a go-between as extended family—grandparents Dadabapa (Salim Rahemtulla) and Dadima (Zaittun Esmail)—descend upon him in a congratulatory frenzy. Committee representatives—Al Nashir (Vijay Mehta) and Mansour (Parm Soor)—upon actually meeting the young man, realize they’ve made a terrible mistake. Hilarity ensues as Bashir tries to escape and his family scramble to maintain a facade of cultural respectability. Figuring into the farcical shenanigans is Gulzar (Pamela Mala Sinha), a woman desperate to see her own son honoured as “Muhki” instead of Bashir.
Director Paolo Santalucia’s achieves a snappy, screwball comedy momentum with characters’ lines often landing on top of each other. People chase, cajole, berate and pop in and out of doorways. This moves like a conventional sit-com, what sets it apart from the ubiquitous wash of such entertainments is its cultural specificity. In this way it shares DNA with recent hits like Run the Burbs and Kim’s Convenience. Rahemtulla exploits the familiar tropes as an accessible frame for this heartfelt portrait of an immigrant family’s experience of generational conflict and connection.
Bashir has a number of trademark behavioural quirks that register as somewhat cartoonish. His befuddled eye-blinking tick is especially pronounced, but Rasool makes it feel authentic instead of gimmicky. I was particularly won over by the adorable way he clutches his boom box like a teddy bear as the whirlwind of family and community expectations envelop him.
The ensemble is rife with idiosyncratic behaviours. Soor is a consistent comedic favourite of mine. His wide-eyed and dopey intensity as he falls all over himself, furniture and other people in his sporadic enthusiasm is truly hilarious. Of the large cast, the most depth is given to Sultan and Bashir. Their fraught relationship is the central dramatic concern, with everything else forming an immersive comical backdrop for their journey towards each other and mutual understanding.
Bashir and the audience learn of Sultan’s backstory through his father, Bashir’s grandfather—three generations collapsed into a single touching scene—though this sudden plummet into poignancy feels a little clunky. If the aesthetic and action had been more hyper-stylized, this would be less disconcerting, but the relative naturalism of the play requires a little more finessing of its heartfelt exposition. The acknowledgement of parental sacrifice is, nevertheless, genuinely affecting.
The Wrong Bashir
running May 21 to June 9, 2024
Streetcar Crowsnest, Guloien Theatre (345 Carlaw Ave.)
running time: 2 hours, 15 minutes (with intermission)
Salim Rahemtulla and Sharjil Rasool in ‘The Wrong Bashir’, Photo by Dahlia Katz