In interviews, playwright Dipika Guha acknowledges that sometimes her plays veer dangerously close to cultural appropriation. This is certainly true of her 2016 comedy “Yoga Play” (available for streaming at syracusestage.org through Feb. 20), which uses a public relations crisis in an athleisure wear corporation to explore the tension between yoga as a centuries old spiritual practice and, as is often the case today, a vehicle for billions in corporate profit. As Joan, the CEO of Guha’s fictional Jojomon corporation says: “A yogi is a young woman with a lavender latte.”
While keeping the comedy front and center, Guha manages to weave quite a few hot button topics into the spandex of her play. Jojomon has drawn the wrath of the internet for first, refusing to make its over-priced yoga apparel in sizes larger than 8 (body shaming), and second, and even more critically, for contracting an overseas manufacturer that uses child labor (corporate exploitation). In addition, high ranking executive Fred (Ricky Pak) lives in fear of being deported to Singapore where he cannot live openly as a gay man (homophobia), while his co-executive Raj (Rishan Dhamija) is a preppy Ivy League grad who hails from Delaware and knows precious little of his family’s Hindu heritage (cultural identity). All this in just the first scene. Soon Guha’s characters are spiraling toward the outrageous in a ludicrously misguided attempt to rescue corporate profits by restoring the company’s perceived “authenticity.” It is very funny and at the same time potentially risky, as theater should be.
Once, when the contemporary Scottish playwright David Greig was asked about the content of his sometimes edgy plays, he replied, “If as theatre artists we’re not addressing important issues, what are we doing?” Of course, and this is key, the treatment of the issues must be handled with respect and care. Guha, who was born in Calcutta, lived in Russia and the UK, and is now based in California (she writes for the TV hit “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”), speaks from first-hand experience when she introduces culturally sensitive material into her plays.
“As someone who’s adapted to new places so many times, I’ve seen how much of my identity I’ve either adopted or dropped for survival reasons. If this is true for all of us, then how do we really know who we are? This question gains political heft in a time when our sense of who we are is dividing us more than uniting us. I find myself returning to this question urgently in my work, whether it’s through comedy or through a more serious or lyrical lens,” Guha said in an interview with the Playwrights Center.
In approaching “Yoga Play” for Syracuse Stage, new associate artistic director Melissa Crespo enlisted the aid of dramaturg Sidikha Ashraf to help the cast and creative team understand the breadth of complex issues in which the play unfolds. “It had to be a dramaturg, someone from South Asia, someone new, and Sidikha was more than capable, smart and enthusiastic,” Crespo explained. There were a lot of questions that needed to be answered knowledgeably and with sensitivity.
Ashraf, a Tamil-American Muslim (born and raised in Queens) and a yoga practitioner, jumped right in, studying the script, researching for a month, and providing accurate information and context during the initial rehearsal play readings. “What was important in ‘Yoga Play’ was to get multiple points of view and make it a safe space while pointing out what is wrong with the system,” she explained. “Yoga here in the West is big but has been completely messed up.” She added that she hopes the play will inspire people to treat laborers in the athleisure industry with humanity.
“Sidikha added a lot to the understanding of the play, the psychology of the characters, and the circumstances of every situation that played out,” said Crespo, who used resources from the Latinx Playwright’s Circle to find Ashraf.
Ashraf, too, is an accomplished storyteller as a writer, comedian and actor. She’s written for a pre-school comedy television program in development with DreamWorks Animation and for a comedy in development with Wildseed Studios and Netflix. Sidikha was the 2019-2020 artistic fellow at The New Group, and a Young Playwrights fellow at the Atlanta Horizon Theater Company’s 2017 New South Young Playwrights Festival. She continues to spread laughter as playground associate for the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, where she provides school-age child care and teaches drama and comedy.