Adil Najam
Although I have always found Umar Sharif’s comedy to be socialy poignant, hard-hitting, and often hilarious, I must confess that I was not a great Umar Sharif fan growing up. This was largely an age and timing thing. But it is quite clear that there has been no stage comedy phenomenon in Pakistan like Umar Sharif either before or after him.
Although he has now taken on a broader – even sub-continental – canvas, his early work was very rooted in the Pakistan mega-city culture; especially Karachi and Lahore.ÂÂ His ‘burger’ kid routine really went home on the social and economic apartheid that still tears at our society. Sometimes the pungency of his jugaat masks the craftsmanship of his theatrical performance, but to me there are very few who command the ‘stage’ presence that he does, particularly in the stage play. Indeed, he was to stage comedy in Pakistan was Fifty-Fifty (and here) was to television comedy.
Moeen Akhtar, obviously, has ruled he stage show scenaro like no other; but his stage presence is of compare and senior fankaar. The Umar Sharif phenomenon is primarily about the stage comedy play. Even though he has tried to become a Mueen Akhtar look-alke as stage compare, that is not his forte and in that role Moeen still rule (at least for me).
And within the genre of the Pakstani stage comedy play, there is nothing that even remotely comes close to Baqra Qistoun Peh; which, in some ways, is Omar Sharif’s signature performance. Here is a clip from that play which demonstrates why:
Very interesting, unrelated story in Dawn today(night):
‘Dawn advertisement ban challenged’
http://www.dawn.com/2007/03/07/top3.htm
Good to see my favorite paper sticking to its guns…lets see what our courts do about this.
Umer Sharif – not only known in Pakistan but across the Globe, has earned a lot of fame for his comedy shows, personally Umer Sharif has done a trumendous work over the years but unfortunately he has at times stepped out of the decency grove for his comedy stage shows which are not at all suitable for family entertainment, I wonder how can people go to the stage shows with their wives and kids.That’s the only black spot which has lost some of the Umer sharif audience otherwise he’s the best at the art of comedy.On the other hand comparing is not his virtue and he can never call himself as an accomplished comparer.
Adil, Now that I have recognized you from a previous post (I think we talked about SAF games of 89 at some point), I remember umer sharif showing up in one of your talk shows you did from islamabad. I rememeber that show because I think he was really funny [for that time an may be for that age of mine] that night. I used to wonder what happened to that host after you dissapeared.. :) I think your place was taken over by naeem bukhari.. ;)
I stopped watching him about ten years ago. I think he just lost his touch after moving on to the movies….that spontaneous unscripted line from him just wasn’t there anymore.. I think it was because he lost touch with the street itself that made him popular. A couple of times it was sad to see him show up on stage completely wasted. All what you wrote about him is true up until bakra qistoan purr. Also, very people know that he “was” a terrific on stage singer. At times he even surpassed the original singers of the songs he sang.
Stage shows from lahore are without a doubt funny.. but they cannot be watched with the family. In fact there is hardly any woman in their physical audience. That said, I don’t think I know a better jugat baaz than Amanullah.
Umer Sharif is good but I think there are some really funny characters in Punjabi stage dramas. These include Mastana, Amanullah, Tariq Teddi and others. Although Punjabi Stage is not well recognized and acknowledged in the bigger picture probably because of the vulgar language that is used these days on stage. But I guess there is a huge huge audience in many cities in Punjab who come and enjoy their jokes.