“It’s the best special to come out of this country,” says comedian Prakash Mehta. For those not in the know, Prakash is comedian Aakash Mehta’s twin brother, and living proof that nepotism exists in the Indian standup comedy scene. If you’re surprised to learn that Aakash has a twin, you’re not the only one. If you’re skeptical about his existence, you have company too. We’re not saying Aakash is lying but the two have never been seen together, at the same time, if you catch our drift. A typical Peter Parker, Spider-Man situation. Moving on. The show Prakash is referring to is his debut special Dark.
Releasing on 2 August and available till 25 August on Paytm Insider for INR 499, the show is about a person who has lost everything in his life. For context, Prakash’s wife has left him. She kicked him out of his own house. He can’t meet his kid anymore. And now she has remarried. He’s in a very dark phase of his life and that’s precisely what he’s talking about in the two-hour show.
As a person, Prakash has a pretty nihilistic approach to life. He’s given up all hope and it’s his life’s mission to prove to the audience that nobody is an inherently good person. In the process, he touches upon everything from sports to beggars to death, while giving us glimpses into his very “real” life.
In the works since 2019, Dark was originally a show that Aakash used to perform. But one night before a performance in Mumbai, he had a certain special brownie and passed out. The show still had to go on, so Prakash stepped in to save the day.
That’s when Prakash realised that comedy came to him quite naturally. “I realised I’m just way better at it than Aakash,” says Prakash. “It’s also easy because the audience in India sucks. All they want is set-up and punchline. They can’t think for sh*t. But yeah, I performed the show so much better than him that we decided he should just open and leave the rest up to me.”
In the Instagram post announcing the release of the special, Aakash wrote that this is his favourite show to open for, mainly because he has to be on stage only for 10 minutes and gets paid for the entire performance. But that’s just part of the reason. Prakash’s capriciousness is what he enjoys more.
“Every show is so unpredictable when Prakash is performing,” Aakash told us. “There’s no way you can tell what’s going to come out of his mouth next. The only thing he cares about is exploring that part of the brain that makes you hate yourself, you know? It’s 1-2 hours dedicated to figuring out how far can he go on that particular day.”
With that in mind, Aakash, Prakash and their team decided to release the special behind a paywall rather than releasing it on YouTube. “This was our last hope because this material can’t be public,” says Aakash. “Eventually it’ll be available for YouTube members but that’s about it. It’s been such a challenge to even get one bit that we can put out on YouTube as a promo.”
This isn’t because Prakash is going after the big no-nos of Indian comedy—politics and religion. It’s just that his thoughts might be perceived in the wrong way. “The problem in India is that nobody is listening to the joke,” adds Aakash. “Everyone is just constantly looking for trigger words as opposed to listening to what the comedian is saying. And this entire special dances around so many trigger words. I don’t want my family to watch this if I’m being honest with you. It’s just going to make dinner so uncomfortable for us.”
“It’s a conceptually dark show,” he adds. “It’s not just a comedian who is doing flips for an hour. That’s just lazy writing. This is a person who has completely given in to the darkness of life. Because of that so many things get a lot harder to keep in. We have scrapped over four hours of material because there was so much topical stuff about various protests and genocides and the elections.”
Every comedian in the country is worried about whether they will get to go up on stage tomorrow. It is not their fault entirely that it exists as a situation. But it is their fault entirely that it continues to be so.
– Prakash Mehta
With Dark, Prakash aims to push the envelope and take Indian comedy to a higher level. He’s tired of comedians taking the easy route and talking about “ghar ke kalesh” and “fake mom problems”. The comedian wants his peers to follow suit and be “real” on stage. “The audience is getting dumber year on year,” he said. “The comedians are getting safer every year. Everyone is scared to piss off the wrong politician. What the f*ck is the point? If you’re so scared why are you on stage?”
Prakash goes on to refer to the medieval times when the Catholic Church had allegedly banned musicians from using the tritone or augmented fourth chords because they sounded “devilish”. That myth might have been debunked now, but the larger point Prakash was trying to make was that the artists of the time found a way around it. That’s precisely what he wants his fellow comedians to do, rather than reverting to the lazy tropes that rule Indian television comedy.
“Everyone just cares about the money,” he added. “Nobody cares about the art or leaving a lasting impression with their words. Every comedian in the country is worried about whether they will get to go up on stage tomorrow. It is not their fault entirely that it exists as a situation. But it is their fault entirely that it continues to be so. Look at Kunal Kamra. He paid the price for being honest. No other comic is willing to do that.”
The buck doesn’t stop here for Prakash. He has many more incorrigible things to say and has promised to be back with a brand new show, this time called Darker. Whether he can fulfil that promise though, hinges on the success of his debut show.
You can watch Dark here.
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