Off-Broadway Review: “Indian Ink”

Two actresses, some fifty years apart, portray sisters. Different time periods and locations weave together through fast paced flowing dialogue. A history lesson of clashing cultures unfolds. I must be at a Tom Stoppard play.

The playwright, famous for works like Arcadia and The Real Thing, has crafted a sweeping narrative across two time periods with Indian Ink, at the Roundabout Theatre Company. The play centers on British poet Flora Crewe (Romola Garai) who travels to India in the late 1920’s for her health. We gain knowledge of her escapades by way of her sister Eleanor (Rosemary Harris) as she discusses Flora’s life with a biographer in 1980’s England.

Flora befriends an Indian painter Nirad Das (Firdous Bamji), whom she poses for. Paintings, poems, and ideas are exchanged between them. Set during the time when India was part of the British Empire, the two artists frequently find themselves navigating questions of art and culture. Did Britain “make” India into a culturally rich territory, or did they already have their own Shakespeare and Monet before colonization?

As Flora’s story unfolds in the past, the biographer (Neal Huff) tries to piece together information in the 80’s from her old letters.  As he searches for clues to a potential nude portrait and romance between poet and painter, the play also becomes a story about what is lost to time.

If this all sounds like it’s a lot to digest, that’s because it is. Stoppard covers and even wider swath than usual in this play, and is only sometimes successful at navigating it. The play moves along at a clip, and I never found myself bored or lost. But, the wide array of topics and history he covers results in dialogue that only scratches the surface of the issues presented. Characters will argue and offend over cultural merits of their homeland, yet they will kiss and make up by the end of the scene. The result is a script that is a bit too neat and tidy and I wish it had dug deeper.

The cast is thankfully in top form. Romola Garai, in her Off-Broadway debut has an elegant stage presence that anchors the show. She has warmth to her voice and delivery, and gives a sumptuous quality to a woman who must otherwise abide by all things “proper”.

Rosemary Harris is in fine form (is she capable of being less that stellar?) as Eleanor. She is a woman balancing the spirited girl of her youth, with the conservative aristocratic lady all older British women seem to become. Harris has wonderful chemistry with Bhavesh Patel, as the son of Nirad Das who arrives seeking stories of his father. Their sparring matches over colonialism are entertaining and insightful.

Speaking of Mr. Das, I have never seen Firdous Bamji on stage before, but I hope to again soon. He is intensely vulnerable and enchanting as the humble Indian painter. His specificity and honesty in the aforementioned kiss-and-make-up scenes gives them legitimacy. And there is quite the spark between he and Ms. Garai as their characters grow closer.

Director Carey Perloff deserves credit for keeping the time jumps and complex plot understandable. Lighting designer Robert Wierzel transforms a rather simple set into a gorgeously lush background. And without spoiling anything, I will say they have created a clever and gorgeous final tableau. It accomplishes the daunting task of weaving Stoppard’s many ideas together without the use of words.

Nirad Das mentions the concept of “Rasa” often throughout the play. Rasa he explains, is the essence of a piece of art and the emotion that an artist conjures in the audience.  The rasa in Indian Ink would be more apparent if the script dug past the surface of its compelling topics and didn’t keep its characters at arm’s length so often. As it stands, the emotional attachment only appears sporadically.

Indian Ink
Roundabout Theatre Company
Laura Pels Theatre at the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for the Arts
111 West 46^th Street, Manhattan
Written by: Tom Stoppard
Directed by: Carey Perloff
Starring: Romola Garai, Rosemary Harris, Firdous Bamji, Bhavesh Patel, and Neal Huff
Run Time: 2 Hours and 45 Minutes, with one intermission
Through: November 30, 2014