By Maliha Rehman
As first episodes go, this could serve as an example of an ideal one.
Kabhi Main Kabhi Tum, the drama marking Fahad Mustafa’s return to TV drama acting, managed to live up to the expectations built up through its extensive promotions with its very first episode. You got to know the main characters, their various personality traits and got a fair inkling of some of the conflicts up ahead. You also laughed a bit at some of the jokes cleverly fitted into the script. And you never got bored.
In retrospect, the story isn’t really a new one and some of the twists up ahead can be easily predicted. It’s just being told really well. Director Badar Mehmood, writer Farhat Ishtiaq and the motley crew of actors forming the cast do a fine, fine job.
The drama, for instance, opens up with a long shot inside a home where a wedding is just about to take place and preparations are well underway. It’s aesthetically pleasing, with baskets full of marigolds being brought into the home and Bushra Ansari – the matriarch in the home – giving directions on where to place them. In various scenes, music is added in; a voice musically chanting ‘Loser’ when Fahad Mustafa’s character walks in and a peppy beat accompanying Hania Aamir’s initial scenes. It all adds to the viewing experience.
One after the other, we meet the characters. Fahad Mustafa is Mustafa, our happy-go-lucky hero who doesn’t let the troubles of the world burden him. He’s a tech expert and hacker and he’d rather earn his own rather than do listen to the orders of a boss in a job. He winds through the streets of Karachi on his motorbike, stays up all night glued to various electronic gadgets, has an unbelievably messy room and doesn’t get the least bothered by the admonitions of his father.
Mustafa’s brother Adeel, played by Emmad Irfani, is about to get married and the two are in sharp contrast to each other. Where Mustafa is carefree, Adeel is obsessed with maintaining appearances. He is pompous to the core, boastful of his expensive belongings and openly declaring that he hates mediocrity. Adeel is so wrapped up in his pretenses that he doesn’t deter from telling his fiancé that she needs to get a high GPA in university because she is going to be his wife. At another point, when his fiancé tells him that her father wants to transfer Rs 5 lakhs into his account, Adeel is openly disdainful, pointing out that he has furniture in his room that is far more expensive – why would he replace it with substandard, local furniture worth Rs 5 lakh?
Which brings us to Adeel’s fiancé – Sharjeena – enacted by Hania Aamir. She’s family-oriented, simple, with strong ethics – and it is evident that while she had allowed her family to accept Adeel’s proposal because she had liked how successful and focused he was, she had not expected him to be the arrogant brat that he is turning out to be. She’s having doubts but is also unlikely to call off the wedding, now that is right around the corner.
Towards the end of the episode, Adeel’s boss confesses to him that she has been in love with him and is visibly distressed on hearing the news of his impending wedding. One can expect the boost this will give to Adeel’s already inflated ego. He misses out on meeting Sharjeena and his sister at the market – something that he had promised that he would do – and then, when he does talk to her, he admonishes her for constantly calling him and not understanding that he would be busy.
The stage is set for this wedding to break up. And when it does, as drama storylines go, it is very likely that Mustafa will have to step in as groom. The story may then progress to heavy duty emotions – the teasers have shown a distressed Sharjeena, an agitated Mustafa smashing a looking glass and Bushra Ansari’s voice ringing in with a taunt. One hopes, though, that Kabhi Main Kabhi Tum’s later episodes are as crisply edited and well-paced as this initial one. Emotional breakdowns and sad scenes are inevitable in desi dramas but they can be intelligently placed in the narrative rather than dragged endlessly and celebrated through multiple flashbacks.
For now, Kabhi Main Kabhi Tum gives you much to smile about; the way Mustafa’s room is messy and his sister – played by Maya Khan – comes in to scold him and inadvertently starts clearing up; the way Mustafa gets arrested by mistake and when his father – Javed Sheikh – returns with him, he sarcastically declares that he has come back from Hajj and should be greeted with floral wreaths; Mustafa’s trip with his father to the market to make purchases for the wedding and how he is very evidently his mother’s favorite.
The cast is an expert one: Fahad Mustafa looks great and is instantly likeable, making you wonder why he even quit TV drama acting for the first place. In fact, Fahad slips into Mustafa’s skin so effortlessly that you feel that he is quite similar to the character in reality– I am looking forward to seeing more shades to Mustafa as the character progresses. Emmad Irfani acts very well and looks so good that you find it very believable that his boss must have secretly been in love with him! It’s good to see Emmad back on-screen in what seems to be a meaty role. Hania Aamir, it has been proven in past dramas, is a pro at playing the likeable, good-at-heart romantic interest. Her character’s journey, however, is yet to unfold.
Javed Sheikh’s scenes may have been fewer but he is brilliant, nevertheless, taunting his children, his wife and enacting the harried father to the tee.
What more could a first episode need? You feel like you know the characters, you are aware of a brewing storm and while you may be able to predict what happens next, you still want to see how the characters will respond to it.
Quite riveting. First episodes often are. Let’s hope that Kabhi Main Kabhi Tum stays that way.
What do you think?