Sketches of satire

Sudha Pillai, while quitting her job last year, had only one thought on her mind — to spend more time with her 75-year-old mother. She wanted to take care of her mother without being bogged down by her mainstream media job of 24 years. By being with her mom, she automatically embraced her daily routine, a part of which was watching Malayalam serials on different channels for two hours before dinner.

Sudha soon realised how much stupidity was going around. She decided to take a dig at these serials. And what better way than satire! That’s how she started her Instagram page ladiessaloon007 — What I have learnt about relationships from Malayalam TV serials.

According to Sudha, ladiessaloon007 is a satirical take on the stupidity and absurdness that takes place in the society. She stresses on the fact that she never  targets men, women or any section in particular. Her first dig was on Hollywood actresses shedding their clothes in the name of feminism.

As she puts it, “Comedy and satire help me maintain my sanity in the current world where a lot of things are completely unacceptable to my logic. Or else I tend to get angry because I am not reacting to something when I desperately want to. I react to things happening around me and this is the way I do it. When I happened to watch these Malayalam serials with my mother I was taken aback by the dialogues. To me they were really absurd. My mom also watches them to make fun of the various dialogues and sequences. It was only a few weeks ago that I thought I will come up with a series with a satirical approach towards these characters and dialogues.”

The series has various dialogues from famous serials in Malayalam and a line drawing illustration of the same. Some of the captions include: Slapping the wife regularly is essential for a good marriage; Nine out of ten times, love is not the reason you marry someone; Blackmail is the foundation of all relationships; It does not matter whether you have a sex life or not or whether it is good or bad, when you go to bed you should be dressed up like it is the morning of Onam. Always!

Explaining the idea of adopting line drawing pattern with a tint of red, she says, “I am an artist and photographer by passion and therefore illustrating is what comes to me the best. However, pen and ink art require a lot of time as these are more intricate. I, therefore, use line drawings. I love red colour and it finds prominence in all my art works.”

However, Sudha’s intention is not to make fun of these serials. It was the impact that she felt the serials have on the lives of thousands of viewers that persuaded her to start the series.

“Actually, it is an undeniable fact that serials have a subtle impact on those watching them. Initially, when one starts watching them, he/she may feel the dialogues are crap. But over a period of time he/she starts ignoring common sense and relates to the characters and sequences. It gets to a point where viewers begin to see these as situations occurring in their life and even start reacting to things the way their favorite characters do. We do not realise how serious this issue is. When people are getting so influenced by these serials, it is definitely the responsibility of the channels to have content that is not exaggerated,” she says, adding that the channels are creating a false impression that they are providing what the audiences demand.

“What if the audiences don’t have a choice of content? When you are getting the same thing in every shop you are forced to buy the brand that is available. The choice is limited and so you are forced to get entertained with the kind of content these serials have,” says Sudha, adding that casting a fair girl and making her dusky for a serial and promoting that in order to attract more people is the most absurd thing she could cite. The other illustrations on ladiessaloon007 include politics, the things single men and women have to face in society, etc. Sudha says there are illustrations on anything and everything, even on herself, because only a person who makes fun of oneself can do it on others.