Tagenarine Chanderpaul, 83 & Cricketers' Flirtations With Celluloid

ON Wednesday, Indian spinner R Ashwin dismissed a slippery left-handed West Indian to achieve a unique cricketing feat. A feat not underlined by numbers or a bowling spell under queer conditions, but by the bloodline that connected his scalp to someone from his past. Having played a somewhat moody and nervous innings for 12 runs, Tagenarine Chanderpaul was bowled by a delivery that hinted spin but didn’t quite. Chanderpaul’s wicket earned Ashwin this unique and somewhat absurd record of having dismissed both father and son in international cricket. Tagenarine, is of course the son of West Indies legend Shivnarine Chanderpaul, the plucky left-hander with tattooed cheeks. His son, who has made his debut in the national team in his late twenties, however, also has another unique achievement to his name. He is part of a select list of foreign cricketers to have featured in a mainstream Hindi film, playing West Indian batsman Larry Gomes in Kabir Singh’s 83.

Who could forget Shivnarine, a modestly sized man who took to the pitch with a somewhat awkward stance? While the stance itself is peculiarly placed in cricket’s hall of fame, Chanderpaul’s influence on West Indian cricket folklore cannot be overstated. He was the last in the line of cricketing greats in a team that has since struggled to produce talent, made for sport’s purest format — test cricket. Chanderpaul was a characteristic predator, a batsman who lulled aggressive bowlers into a comfort zone before punishing them with thrifty, economical stroke-making. Compared to his peers like Brian Lara and most recently, Chris Gayle, Chanderpaul was grafter of dogged innings. The kind of batting that has become rare in today’s age of guileless, thundering cricket. His son, in his short career so far, is yet to echo any of his father’s ingenious, cautious approach to batting but he has done something that only a few cricketers have — acted in a Bollywood film.

Our very own Kapil Dev has acted not in one but countless Hindi movies. Most recently he plays a smart, almost scene-stealing cameo in the largely charming but also futile Double XL. Ajay Jadeja infamously took to acting with meaty roles in forgettable films like Khel where he delivered the kind of performances that made you squirm and miss his anguished batting. Not many people remember this but Sunil Gavaskar, back in the ‘80s, acted in a couple of films as well; evidently to little effect. Of foreign players, Brett Lee holds a somewhat storied presence in our culture, for being a heartthrob across national boundaries. His lead role in the Indo-Australian production UnIndian aside, Lee has done one of those campy but quintessentially elite B-town things: present a forgettable film award at an IIFA event, to loud cheers and lustful hooting. Irrfan Pathan most recently donned the unenviable crown of a scheming villain in Tamil film Cobra as well.

To an extent cricket and acting feel like allies. To a country obsessed with both, it seems fitting to view the two as interchangeable podiums where money, stardom and soft power converge with startling ease. They are also, however, separated by a thin line, one that delineates fantasies from fraternity. It’s a line both KL Rahul and Hardik Pandya learned of the hard way after a Koffee With Karan episode blew up in their faces for its skewed moral compass. Bollywood might be a culture, but cricket truly is a religion. A religion that might grant its practitioners the veneer of stardom but not without taking away their freedom to mess with its statutes. It’s the kind of sanctimonious regiment that Kabir Singh’s 83 embodied, by trying to create a story with the temperament of a documentary. It’s difficult to remember Chanderpaul’s role in the film, not because it’s unremarkable, but because that is what the realism as film grammar demands — disappearance.

There are probably better things that young Chanderpaul will be in, compared to a Hindi film that flattered eventually to deceive. There is a hint of cricketing irony to Ashwin’s rare feat of having gotten both father and son out, across generations and eras. The father, with his awkward, ungainly stance and many intrepid innings is the stuff of cinematic underdog brilliance. And the son has only just started but has already somewhat experienced the glory of celluloid. Separated by more than a decade, these two dismissals also point to a historic shift in the way we view our cricketing past. We are now old and powerful enough to retrospectively look back at our own sporting heritage. And by extension, everyone else’s. As much as this feels like Ashwin’s unique achievement, it also belongs to the Chanderpauls as well.

Stream highlights from India vs West Indies on OTTplay. Watch 83, the movie, here.