Anybody who wants to make a comedy about a loony family and a dysfunctional hotel should watch Fawlty Towers or Schitt’s Creek—not necessarily for inspiration, but to absorb some great comedy vibes.
The new series, Life Hill Gayi (on Disney+Hotstar) is set in a hotel in the hill town of Panchmoli in picturesque Uttarakhand. Spoilt rich brats Dev (Divyenndu Sharma) and Kalki (Kusha Kapila) drive there with their alcoholic father, Himalay (Vinay Pathak) for a meeting with his father and owner of the hotel (Kabir Bedi), only to find a dilapidated structure, being looked after by Kripal (Atul Shrivastav).
The grandfather addresses them from a screen and informs Dev and Kalki that they have to get the hotel up and running, sharing the responsibilities between the two, and whoever does a better job will inherit his estate. Their cards are blocked so they have no choice but to stay put and make it work. (“Aish ki zindagi khatam,” as the grandpa puts it.) Himalay has obviously been given up as the hopeless idler that he is, and spends most of the series making a nuisance of himself.
The hotel is quickly renovated, and in this age of ratings, they are so worried about getting a bad review that they even give the best room to a suspicious-looking serial killer. The show, directed by Pawan Mistry and written by Jasmeet Singh Bhatia, is off to such a groan-worthy start that things can only get better from there on and they do.
The brother-sister compete like crazy for the medals Dadu gives out to a task well done, but they are obviously out of their depth. Kalki hires an inept bunch of locals as chef, receptionist and security in-charge. There is great comic potential built into the situation, which is simply allowed to slide away. Since things are never seen from the point of view of ‘normal’ guests, there is no way of figuring out just how the hotel is run with a skeletal, untrained staff. (The ‘Type of Guests’ promo for Life Hill Gayi is actually quite amusing, but none of those specimens are seen in the series!)
There is a very unfunny episode of a large bunch of student hikers who cram into a single room and trash it—with some encouragement from Himalay, who is happy to find so many drinking buddies. The bit about a vlogger checking in to find out if stories of a ghost are true is marginally better—far from driving away people, the rush of curious guests actually causes a traffic jam on the narrow approach road to the hotel.
Dev, who is supposedly a management graduate, spends most of his time carrying out a flirtation with the local organic farmer Hima (Mukti Mohan), attempts mansplaining on how she should deal with her workers, and learns a few things they don’t teach at business school.
By the time of the chaos at the wedding of the Sarpanch’s daughter, and the inevitable movie shoot roll around, the viewer has least warmed up to the characters and the three main actors – Vinay Pathak, Divyenndu Sharma and Kushha Kapila are comfortable enough in their comic skins to play their parts with ease. Since the show is shot in Uttarakhand, there is a glimpse of the customs of the locals, and a hint of the troubles that might land on the pristine location with unchecked tourism. The drinking problem among the men, and the women having to run homes with the men being forced to migrate due to unemployment is mentioned in passing. But the ‘come to Uttarakhand message’ is loud and clear (though it is heard and seen better in this week’s other OTT release Gyaarah Gyaarah). Bhagyashree Dassani gets top billing in the end credits, and appears for a small scene at the very end, so it does look as if a Season 2 is on the way.
(This piece first appeared in rediff.com)