Caring and Supporting: Theatre fraternity remembers actor-director Farrokh Mehta

In a career spanning over six decades, Mehta acted in more than 30 English-language plays including Girish Karnads Tughlaq, Partap Sharmas A Touch of Brightness, Edward Albees The Zoo Story, Arthur Millers Death of a Salesman, and Tennessee Williams A Streetcar Named Desire.He also directed plays for Theatre Group Bombay TGB along with theatre doyen and close friend Alyque Padamsee.Remembering Mehta, theatre actor-director Quasar Thakore Padamsee said that by providing a strong baseline to other actors on stage, he allowed them to shine.

Be it Charley, the best friend to protagonist Willy Loman in "Death of a Salesman" or the gravedigger in "Hamlet", actor-director Farrokh Mehta never saw supporting characters as secondary, friends in theatre said, remembering the late actor as a generous human being. Mehta died on Thursday morning at his Mumbai residence at the age of 91, his daughter Anahita Uberoi, also an actor, said.

''He passed away in his sleep on Thursday morning,'' Uberoi told PTI. In a career spanning over six decades, Mehta acted in more than 30 English-language plays including Girish Karnad's "Tughlaq", Partap Sharma's "A Touch of Brightness", Edward Albee's "The Zoo Story", Arthur Miller's "Death of a Salesman", and Tennessee Williams' "A Streetcar Named Desire".

He also directed plays for Theatre Group Bombay (TGB) along with theatre doyen and close friend Alyque Padamsee.

Remembering Mehta, theatre actor-director Quasar Thakore Padamsee said that by providing a strong baseline to other actors on stage, he allowed them to shine. "He spent his entire life playing supporting roles in plays like 'Death of a Salesman', or 'Streetcar Named Desire', he was always playing supporting roles. A lot of us usually see supporting roles as secondary roles that are not important, but Farrokh was the first person who I saw on stage and realised that he was the one supporting the whole show. He is the one who is allowing them, the mercurial talents, to shine," Quasar told PTI.

He added that despite his father, Alyque, and Mehta being childhood friends who went to school together, he developed a different and independent friendship with the late director and remembered him as an "incredibly rare human being".

"I got to see why he was always at the top of every casting sheet my father ever made. Because he would make the show better by being present. It was his sense of care and gentleness, it's a lesson in life, in how to conduct your life with dignity and how to inspire people and engage them, without having to yell and shout," Quasar said. Mehta had also worked closely with veteran theatre actor Dolly Thakore, who felt "honoured" to have shared the space with him on stage. ''We have had such a long association, we were like family. It was a joy to be together. We have been working together for 50 years... It leaves a huge vacuum in our lives. It has been beautiful knowing him. I am so honoured and privileged to have known him, acted with him for so many years. He didn't have an iota of ego in him. He was very generous,'' Dolly told PTI.

Thakore and Mehta worked together in "Death of a Salesman", "A Streetcar Named Desire", among other plays. Besides theatre, Mehta simultaneously worked in the corporate world in top companies such as Tata Sons, Cadbury and Pfizer.

Theatre actor and Alyque-Pearl Padamsee's daughter Raell Padamsee said she had closely known Mehta for many years, courtesy her parents' long loving association with him.

Raell remembered Mehta to be somebody who would always give productive suggestions. ''On stage, he played so many different characters. He spent many years in the production (of) 'Death Of A Salesman', which my father had done four different times. Farrokh and he were there in all four.

"(They would work on) The whole nuances of how different it would be, how they upgraded (it), changed. Besides, he did a huge number of plays with both my parents. So, the last version of 'Death Of A Salesman' was with my production, he always had the right pointers, he would give productive suggestions. We had a loving relationship with him," Raell said. Mehta is survived by his wife, Vijaya Mehta, and daughter Anahita Uberoi.

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