Paradise or the Impermanence of Ice Cream
Studio Theatre, Darwin Entertainment Centre
93 Mitchell Street
Darwin City NT 0800
Australia
Take a wild ride to paradise with Indian Ink’s powerful new play about impermanence – of life, love… and ice cream! Kutisar is dead and lost between paradise and hell. A cantankerous vulture keeps harassing him, and a lover from his past holds the key to his salvation. On an existential post-mortem journey to correct mistakes of his past, Kutisar joins the feisty Meera on a madcap quest to save the critically endangered vultures that play a vital role in Parsi sky burials. Inspired by Ernest Becker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning treatise The Denial of Death and infused with laughter, Paradise… blows your mind while melting your heart faster than an ice cream on a Mumbai summer day. Supported by an immersive sound design, Jacob Rajan delivers a wildly versatile solo performance playing seven characters, including the bumbling Kutisar, the buck-toothed hero of Rajan’s beloved The Guru of Chai. Loaded with warmth and depth, Paradise… is a moving production that melds a dash of Bollywood disco and playful puppetry with thought-provoking musings on the eternal afterlife, the looming extinction of India’s sacred vultures, and the beauty and value of the fleeting and ephemeral.