Noida Nightmare:
The lack of censorship on streaming platforms means that a show like Tribhuvan Mishra CA Topper can get made. On the surface it is about a man forced to become a gigolo because of financial pressures, but it also attempts to be dark, funny and in its own way, socially observant about current sexual mores.
Tribhuvan Mishra (Manav Kaul) works in a government office that deals with building permits, but is resolutely honest. He lives in a Noida colony with his wife Ashoklata (Naina Sareen) and two kids, providing just enough for them, but also unable to stretch the monthly budget when extra expenses come up. When the bank where his life’s savings were deposited goes belly-up, Tribhuvan is in dire straits (a CA topper does not invest in diversified portfolios?).
When his harried wife, constantly taunted by her brother Shambhu (Sumit Gulati) and deceptively demure sister-in-law (Shweta Basu Prasad), tells Tribhuvan that she wished he had some marketable talent. Tribhuvan recalls Ashoklata complimenting his love-making skills and decides to put that to work for him.
A profile on a site offering sex, instant tips from a friendly gigolo (Jitin Gulati) and the mousy accountant with the handle of CA topper, succeeds in acquiring a large client base of satisfied women. He never seems to have any moral qualms about what he does, and how it might affect his family and work if it got out – Noida is a small town after all, and Tribhuvan drives around on a distinctive yellow scooter (alluding to one of Manav Kaul’s plays)!
The story of this unlikely Don Juan of Noida had great potential, but the directors Puneet Krishna and Amrit Raj Gupta, go the usual way of crime and violence. One or Tribhuvan’s happy clients is Bindi (Tillotama Shome) the unhappy wife of Teeka Ram Jain aka Raja Bhaiya (Shubhrajyoti Barat), a gangster who runs a mithai shop as a front. Other Noida lowlife’s abound, so the language is saltier than usual, and guns are branded at regular intervals. Two cops (Faisal Malik, Sunil Saraswat) turn up at Jain’s shop regularly for free snacks, but are clueless about other crimes in their jurisdiction. When they do raid a seedy hotel and catch Tribhuvan in the act with a client, the cops are surprised that there is such a thing as a male prostitute! The woman is unapologetic and unashamed. Why is all the lecture about morality directed at the woman, she asks before stalking off.
The show brings up the issue of female desire, and how women are now capable of seeking pleasure outside when they don’t get it from their men. The dreamy, movie mad Bindi is saddled with a dull, boorish husband, and realizes what she was missing when she meets Tribhuvan—not just sexual gratification, but the simple joy of being looked at with appreciation.
Tribhuvan gets increasingly prosperous, starts looking and behaving more confident, pays off his debts, buys a shop for his wife’s bakery, and would have carried on happily, were it not for Jain’s loyal henchmen discovering where Bindi goes when she sneaks out of the house.
It is as if the makers are somewhat embarrassed by their own plot, and cover up by making it loud, profane, lurid. The interiors are garish, the characters are quirky, and most of the gangsters and their henchmen talk like they just binge-watched three seasons of Mirzapur. The nine-part show has too much padding, like two gangsters constantly bickering about who is better, Shah Rukh or Salman Khan.
Casting Manav Kaul was the masterstroke—the actor looks so decent and sincere, that even when he is up to the neck in sleaze, he looks like none of it touched his soul.
(This piece first appeared in seniorstoday.in)
