Thursday,July2,2009
03
“J
ohnny, do you know this girl,” asks the 60- year-old to a small boy puppet on his lap wear-ing a pink t-shirt and a flowery orange pull-over.“Yes, she lives opposite my house,” replies the puppet.“And where do you live?”“Opposite her house.”The man wipes his forehead,gives me a sheepish smile andtries again. “Where do both of you live?” “Opposite each other”,the puppet cackles at the man’sobvious displeasure. “That’s how it’s done”, he suddenly smileslifting the puppet off his lap andlaying it out on the sofa with thenine other he owns.Shantha Kumar, a retired bank manager, has a habit of throwing his voice on inanimate things,animating them. It was an art hefell in love with when he watchedthe city’s first professional ven-triloquist, M.M. Roy, perform in1975. Back then, ventriloquism was unheard of and he wanted tolearn it but didn’t know where tostart.“When I watched M.M Roy perform, I was astounded. Ithought he had a tape running inside the puppet but I realisedthe jokes he cracked were sospontaneous that they couldn’thave been recorded beforehand.I spent the entire show trying tofind the source of the voice but Icouldn’t. Later a friend explainedthat it was called ventriloquismand that it was a rare skill,”Shantha Kumar remembers.His work with a bank meantthat he had frequent transfersand when he came to Chennai,he became a member of the Hu-mour Club. In 1998, he witnessedanother performance by M.M.Roy at the club and approachedhim to learn the art. Eightmonths later, Shantha Kumar was a performing ventriloquist.“My guru told me that my lipmovements will reduce withtime, depending on the numberof shows I did. So I began toperform at anniversaries, mar-riages, birthdays and atchurches on weekendsand during my free time.That really helped. I’vedone over 1700 shows inthe last ten years”, heexclaims. When Shantha Kumarretired last year, his hobby came in handy and hasnow become a full-timeprofession. He even runs ablog where he talks abouthis shows and puts upvideos of them.“There are two kinds of ventriloquism; near anddistant. Near is the kindmost people do, with apuppet on their lap or sit-ting next to them. Distantventriloquism is someth-ing like hearing someonetalk from the bottom of a well.In olden days, prank-sters used this trick to foolpeople into thinking that wells or gods spoke tothem,” he laughs.Shantha Kumar’s ven-triloquism career began with Johnny, a humanpuppet that he boughtfrom his guru and hasnow grown into ten in-cluding two monkeys, agirl puppet, a dog, a duck and even a crow! ButJohnny is still his favourite.“I still use Johnny for most of my shows. But the kids prefer themonkey,” he shrugs.Lately, he has begun to teachventriloquism to those interestedand also runs an even manage-ment company where he arrang-es variety entertainment forcorporates, weddings, anniver-saries and other occasions. Thefee varies according to the hoursand the kind of entertainmentneeded.“I’m a writer too,” he says atthe end, hastily adding, “I’vepublished two books but that was before I got into ventrilo-quism. I hope to start writing again sometime soon.”
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You can contact him at 9444148832 or visit his blog at http:// ventshanthakumar.blogspot.com.
LIPSDOLIE
ANUSHA PARTHASARATHY
anushaparthasarathy@hotmail.com
PHOTO : R. RAVINDRAN
Retired bank employeeShantha Kumar not only performs as aventriloquist but also teachesthose who areinterested inlearning thequirky performing art
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