Pound-for-pound, the country’s best political satire show is Khabarnaak. Yes, Azizi might get some guffaws and the slapstick artists at Mazaqraat might get something right once in a while, but it is the Geo show that has become the gold-standard of late.
The irrepressible Mir Mohammad Ali, who won a Presidential Pride of Performance last year, is the fuel of the show. The variety show might have other plus points, but as Aftab Iqbal’s dud of a new show over at Express illustrates, it is Mir who has that “it” factor that keeps the spark alive.
And his cerebral matter is not limited just to his mimicry but the whip-smart one-liners he shoots off while he is in character.
The range of his characters is amazing. Asif Zardari, Nawaz Sharif, Imran Khan and Khwaja Asif you might have expected. Shashi Tharoor, Jawaharlal Nehru, Mahesh Bhatt, Antonio Inoki you might had not. And that is not to mention the Devil himself.
With the affable Naeem Bukhari hosting the show now, it is a far more entertaining watch.
Which brings us to the topic at hand. Now Mir does a pretty mean Imran Khan impression. And once, he had performed as Imran Khan while another mimic (not nearly as talented as him) channelled Reham Khan. But Geo had cooked for its viewers a particularly interesting episode, the comedic motherlode, so to speak: the real Reham Khan appearing with Mir’s Imran Khan.
A teaser trailer made it online, which online viewers can see below.
Mir was in his element but it was Reham Khan who stole the show. Not only was she confident but she also showed a measure of comedic timing of her own.
Alas, the episode was never to be aired. Some inside reports say that the PTI had personally asked the Geo management to kill the episode, while others say that the management had decided this on its own. After all, the channel did get into the PTI’s bad books for much, much less (reporting, along with all other channels, that the party had lost the ’13 elections.)
Now if only one had access to the vault over at Geo’s archives…
Ek jadhgraani ti tom ek mint ayi or chali gie
This column on Khabarnak has brought out the real Naeem Bokhari. A cheap jugat baz much to my dismay. Money can do amazing things but then perhaps practice was on the way down. His kids if he has some, must be but of jokes in the school. But he couldn’t care a less as long as money flows in. Most of us are naeem bokharis one way or the other.Small people.
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