Nothing happens, then everything happens at this coffee lounge
Chaos Lounge:Where everyone is relatable or recognisable
“Outside. The world is falling apart. But inside The Lounge, it’s an ordinary day in a caramelised bubble, where things seem well within control. Until they aren’t.”
Chaos Lounge set in an upmarket coffee locale, is an original script written by Tasmin Anthonisz, founder of Studiolusion, a performance lab for young artists, and directed by Vishan Gunawardena and Haseeb Hassen.
Overseeing The Lounge and maintaining the airy atmosphere within the ‘bubble’ are two baristas. One, levelheaded and grounded, the other, neurotic and highly caffeinated. Frequenting The Lounge are a diverse spread of patrons whom Tasmin describes as either relatable or recognisable to the audience as people they have likely encountered at some point.
A slow and uneventful afternoon devolves into chaos when elements from outside begin to seep into the idyllic atmosphere. Incoming news alerts and warnings create unrest, turning everyone in The Lounge into a potential threat against the bubble.
The cast consists of Theruni Indrapala, Amaz Irshad, Madura Wijeratne, Senshi Fernando, Dulina Chandrasiri, Lakshitha Edirisinghe, Dinoo Wickramage, Tayhani Kannangara, Shanya Perera, Muthumali Perera, Kovindu De Seram, Gavin Weerasinghe, Patrick De Kretser, Charith Dissanayake, Haaziq Zakkey and Aakif Ruzni.
Tasmin began writing the play in 2019 following the mass shootings which occurred in Christchurch, New Zealand, and the subsequent worldwide uproar. She says, “At the time there was a conversation that was happening globally about what exactly defined an act of terrorism and there were all kinds of opinions being shared – it was chaos.”
The idea to set the story against the backdrop of a local coffee shop emerged while conducting a drama workshop at Wesley College when a student, Murthaaz Barry, who is also involved in the production team of Chaos Lounge, arrived for practice after work in his barista’s uniform. Tasmin included this detail in an acting exercise where students were directed to pick a character and setting at random from different pieces of paper. The students happened to pick the prompt ‘coffee shop, two baristas talking about terrorism’. The scene which was created through improvisation gave way to the idea for Tasmin’s script.
A 25-minute version was to be performed in April for the Royal College Drama Competition, but was postponed following the Easter Sunday attacks that month.
The updated version of Chaos Lounge now extending to an hour and 15 minutes, is ‘more poignant’, the trio say with Tasmin adding it has also been updated to include “everything that has happened to us as Sri Lankans in the last three years.”
The trio are collaborating for the third time since Studiolusion’s productions ‘Heirs’ in 2019 and most recently, ‘Chatroom’ last year. Needing collaborators who could accurately capture her vision, Tasmin looked no further than Vishan and Haseeb due to their experience with directing comedy productions, in recent years at the Inter School Shakespeare Drama Competition with ‘Comedy of Errors’ in 2018 and ‘As You Like It’ in 2021.
Haseeb explains that Chaos Lounge, by genre, is not a straight out ‘comedy’, rather a satirical one. “We’re showing people as they are – the way the characters interact in the play, childish, naive, not really willing to listen to the other person’s opinion and their behaviour in general is where the humour stems from.” Vishan adds, “How we present comedy at this time is important because I think we’ve gotten used to laughing at something to be a joke or a character being a joke as opposed to understanding the character’s point of view. Whatever that character is going through we are presenting it as something very real and true to them so I suppose that way it humanizes those characters and doesn’t make them a caricature or a joke and that’s how this play functions.”
Chaos Lounge will be on at the Lionel Wendt Theatre on March 24 at 7.30 p.m. and on March 25 at 3.30 p.m. and 7.30 p.m. The production is presented in partnership with Frimi and supported by Tea Avenue, Akbar Brothers (Pvt) Ltd and Giovanni’s Pesto Pizza.
Tickets priced at Rs.3500, Rs.3000, Rs.2500, Rs.2000 and Rs.1500 (balcony) are available at the Lionel Wendt.
For updates follow Studiolusion on Instagram @studiolusion and on Facebook.
Call 0112 695 794 or Whatsapp 0776 975 657 for inquiries.
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