OKie friends ' there's been too much speculation lately about the future of our favourite show ' is it being replaced/not? Are the trps high enough? Will Anya get married or engaged? Etc etc etc. I for one have become tired thinking about the endless possibilities/what-ifs. And I also sooo want to get rid of my dukhi aatma tag ' so I taxed my nanhi si dimaag to think about what works in the current TV shows and how we can "incorporate" those ideas into our show to create a hit ' hopefully no one will now call me a dukhi aatma or dukhi aatma ki ma or rajma or upma.
Scenario 1 ' The daily diaries of a sanskaari bahu
The show Navya will now all about love ' love after marriage. Yup, our very own Navya will now be married (arranged marriage of course) to Anant. We will show the pre-wedding rituals for about six months, and the show will highlight the big problems faced by today's brides-to-be: finding a good tailor, whether the boy's family should be served samosas or kachoris when they come to meet the girl's family, whether the wedding ring should be made of gold or platinum, whether the mehendi ceremony should be held in the palatial ancestral home or in the nearby 7-star hotel, etc.
The actual wedding ceremony will be shown over three months to milk TRPs to the maximum. Other post-wedding rituals like bidaai can be stretched to another couple of months at least. So that's the first year sorted.
We will take care that there are enough family members of marriageable age, so that there can be at least one wedding a year on the show.
Apart from this, there will be various tracks to keep viewers engrossed, for example:
- Nok-jhonk between Navya and bua-dadi because Navya added 2 teaspoons of sugar in her father-in-law's tea, instead of 1 teaspoon. This can be repeated in various ways (eg Navya using too little oil in the cooking, Navya forgetting to wipe the dinner plate 15 times, etc etc)
- The family will celebrate all the festivals possible in a year ' given the sanskaari background of Anant's family, viewers can look forward to enjoying celebrating a minimum of two festivals in a month, including full-moon, no moon, solar and lunar eclipses, etc. In addition, there will be mahaepisodes focussing on wedding anniversaries and birthdays of each and every member of the family.
- We will get to see minute details of Anya's life ' eg what Navya packed in Anant's lunch box, whether Navya had orange juice or mango juice with her breakfast, whether dinner menu should have arhar daal or mung daal, etc etc. Once breakfast, lunch and dinner are sorted, we will get to enjoy watching Anya deciding on what to wear for the day, Anant complaining to Navya about unironed shirts, broken shirt buttons etc. leading to misunderstandings/coochie-cooing between the two.
- In all this, we don't have to forget the Mishra family ' they will invite/be invited to the above-mentioned festivals, there will be separate tracks focussing on Renu's troubles, Harsh's exams, cricket coaching, Gudiya's nappy changes, etc etc.
Scenario 2 ' Devrani-Jethani Saga
Post-marriage, the show will start focussing on the evil machinations of a vamp jethani (Rama) and the gullible devrani (Navya). The jethani will try every conspiracy in the world, right from mixing karela juice in bua-dadi's kheer prepared by Navya to washing Navya's non-colourfast sarees with bua-dadi's light coloured ones. Even after 1,345 attempts by the jethani to get Navya into trouble, Navya will still blindly trust Rama and take all the blame on herself. This story can be dragged for a minimum of two to three years show-casing more and more ridiculous scenarios. Navya will get all the chances in the world to shed a single tear,raise eyebrows, to try and smile while shedding her tear, etc.
Scenario 3 ' Nayi soch, naye sawaal...!
Now, this is truly path-breaking stuff. After the marriage, Anant- yes you heard it right ' Anant comes to stay with the Mishras. The show is now all about him initially being immature, mandbuddhi, ziddi, etc and slowly, the Mishras, with their patience and understanding turning him into a mature(ish), less-ziddi and buddhimaan damaad. This will be a story where he discovers love and warmth in his sasuraal, and as a plus, we will get to see him in lovely kurtas, tees etc... Navya has a limited role ' going to office and back, occasional dialogues, etc. There will be plenty of, ahem, romantic coochie-cooing between these two.
Scenario 4 ' Kghissi KKpeeti KKKfoorrrmullla
Note ' all the extra "k"s and spelling mistakes in the title are intentional. We will be dipping into tried and tested stuff here ' including: memory loss, characters dying and coming back from the dead (truly an "amar" kahaani), vamps with interesting bindis, extramarital affairs, fake pregnancies, leaps in the story ' which means we will end up with a 546-year old udibaba, business rivalries (Anant's family press being closed down, all of them kangaal and then re-building their business empire) etc etc. The show is guaranteed to run for at least 7-8 years.
So ' what do you think? Any more ideas? Take it away, folks...
Hugs
Usha
Mangal Lakshmi
Bade Achhe Lagte Hain
