The curtains unfold to a scene in the hospital wherein Dr Pinto (Audrey Mohanan) informs Mr Dias (Frebren Fernandes) that the newborn has liver complications and an immediate transplant is required to save the child. Mr Dias agrees for the deal and a woman volunteers to assist.
At the rehabilitation centre, there’s reporter Raymond (Joash Almeida), who interviews Dr Joster (Joster D’Souza) for assistance to all those (young and old) addicted to drugs and alcoholism.
Dr Joster himself was an alcoholic once upon a time and over a period of time managed to overcome his weakness. At the rehab centre run by Dr Joster, there’s Br Philomen (Mathew de Souza), Sr Juan (Jacinta Fernandes), Macky (Andrea Dias) and Donald (Alister Fernandes), who are there to assist, in their own way, all the victims admitted.
As elderly patients, there’s Jack (Derrick D’Mello), Johny (Joao da Silva), Brenda (Marta de Souza) and others at the rehab centre, who have different tales to relate regards their addiction to alcohol. Apart from the seniors, there’s also Aiden (Simon D’Silva) and Angel (Maricia Fernandes) in their youthful days. But the former is an alcoholic, while the latter is a drug addict.
Aiden and Angel cannot do without their daily dose and both look helpless and hapless at the centre. But Dr Joster, along with his assistants, tries his best to give them the treatment.
After a while, Regina (Regina Cunha) comes in for counselling, while Br Philomen is there to teach them yoga, breathing exercises and dance to get their minds diverted from the evil.
As part of the rehabilitation, when the inmates are sharing their own and unique stories, Brenda gets very emotional and goes into dementia. Many stories unfold among the inmates and their links and connections get unearthed over a period of time.
Tiatr ‘The Healing House’ focuses on the rehabilitation of alcoholics and drug addicts. Alcohol and drugs are not the sole option to overcome turmoil in life—this is the message conveyed in the presentation. There were many intricate stories woven in the presentation, thus confusing the viewers.
There are some fine performances from the artistes on stage. Joster stands tall as the head of the rehab centre, while Marta, Derrick, Joao Simon and Maricia are good in their respective characters. Other artistes have extended good support to the main cast.
In the comic acts, there’s Mathew, Jacinta, Andrea and Alister with good dose of laughter pills, but exaggeration in some acts could have been avoided.
The section of renditions, the opening is a choral, followed by six solos, duo, duet, trio and quartet. A decent solo by Nathan Xavier and a comedy solo from Mathew Fernandes were appreciated by the audience. Roy Menezes (saxophone) and his musical team assisted all the singers on stage.
The stage sets by Mayur Ghadi and lights by Tejas Khedekar deserve a mention. The background music by Kiran Barve was tactfully handled.