TV’s most loved, most deranged family is readying itself to be unleashed on film. And if our conversation with all its actors is anything to go by, it might just be as riotous

Malay Desai (MUMBAI MIRROR; September 26, 2010)

What began as a joke is now… well, a bigger joke. Khichdi, the TV series christened after the ubiquitous rice-lentil dish of the subcontinent, will be served on a larger platter — the big screen, this week. The promoters are relaying this from the rooftops, and with good reason.

After all, no other product of our TV heritage - Hum Log, Malgudi Days, CID et al has made it to 70mm, a trend the West adopted years ago.

The sitcom, a brainchild of writer Aatish Kapadia and then Gujarati film actor Jamnadas Majethia opened in 2002 amidst a wave of expensive game shows and melodramatic soaps.

It took self-deprecating humour to a new high (or low, as some might feel) and grabbed TRPs. Its second season wound up at its peak in 2005, but not before beginning a trend of Gujarati characters in TV serials, earlier set only by ‘Malhotra’-esque Punjabis.

The serial’s Parekh family, played by veteran actors of the vernacular stage is now etched in telly history: Anang Desai, aka ‘Babujee’, the timid head of the family, ‘Jayshree’; his gossip-loving daughter-in-law (Nimisha Vakharia); the idiotic couple, ‘Praful-Hansa’ (the endearing Rajiv Mehta and Supriya Pathak) while producer Jamnadas Majethia himself is Himanshu the buffoon. The two More >