If you are planning to see this amusing but unsubtle take on single parenting, then please don’t make the mistake of watching the BBC’s Lost Boys & Fairies first. While the BBC series persuades us into its male-parenting zone effortlessly, Single Papa drags us in, almost holding our eyelids open to ensure that we keep watching.
Not that we needed that much persuasion. Single Papa gives off sparkling, vibrant vibes. But it insists on over-explaining everything, even the silliest of jokes, which are too bland to land. That would have been perfectly okay—no one is getting into watching Single Papa thinking it is an epic—had the writers and directors not force-fed the viewers, like the cute baby Amul, so named after the milk products, and we are told this intermittently, as though it is product endorsement, or is it?).
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Baby Amul is played by Hami Ali, who is, understandably, the least self-aware and the most endearing performer. In an author-backed role, Kunal Kemmu channels his inner Aamir Khan (they were co-stars once upon a time in Raja Hindustani). Kemmu is more eager to prove himself as an actor than his character is to prove himself a worthy father.
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That said, Single Papa is in no way a slog to hog. It is a fun watch, often with doses of sparkling humour which suffer from overkill. It doesn’t convey the easygoing mood of Perfect Family, which demonstrated a keen sense of familial chaos without bending backwards to seem knowledgeable.
This one, I am happy to say, doesn’t even try to get ahead of itself. Even when Single Papa gets serious in tone, the undercurrents of banter and raillery reign supreme. Neha Dhupia and Manoj Pahwa are common to both Perfect Family and Single Papa. Ms Dhupia seems to be taking her new image as the solemn, experienced Gyan Aunty a tad too seriously. Still, she knows her craft, as does Pahwa, who must now be playing the family patriarch with his eyes shut and mouth open (to yawn).
Ayesha Raza as Pahwa’s wife attempts to evoke laughter with her overnight transformation from Poonam the housewife to Poons the socialite. She is mildly amusing and that’s the politest way to put it. Prajakta Kohli is excellent as Kunal Kemmu’s sister. But talented actors like Suhail Nayyar and Ankur Rathee and Isha Talwar are wasted in underwritten roles.
When there are six lengthy episodes, why can’t the peripheral characters be given space to grow? My favourite character in Single Papa is Parbat Singh, the beefy but maternal ‘Manny’ who has a question: why are only women seen to have nurturing instincts? Perhaps more of him in the sequel, if we must have a sequel.