Watch: Just how funny are men who combine lipstick with slapstick?
‘Paagal Ladka’ joins the bandwagon of men dressed as women to elicit laughter.
Men caricaturing women, dressed in outlandish clothes and makeup, seems to generate laughter only in India. A hirsute man draped in a head scarf and pouting is ridiculous, but where is the humour in it?
And yet scores of men are debuting on social media platforms with these acts of buffoonery. Joining the list is Girish Dimri, whose internet avatar is named Paagal Ladka. The boy from Ambala updates his Facebook profile with videos where he plays a range of all-too-stereotyped characters like a bimbette and a querulous mother (although he plays men too, such as a cantankerous father and a slacker son).
In this YouTube video compilation of his multiple roles, Dimri films reactions in given scenarios where father berates his son, where the bimbette plans for her selfie schedule and ends with the son realising the importance of talking to his mother whom he avoids. The testy situations are captured in 30 second capsules with the humour delivered through a punchline.
Dimri describes his skits as the “funniest videos to laugh” at on his Facebook page, where the content is being viewed, shared and liked in reasonable numbers, though he hasn't exactly achieved the popularity of Pammi Aunty just yet.
Actor Gaurav Gera paved the way for internet celebrities with his impersonation of Chutki, a young woman with a dishevelled look and funny ripostes with a shopkeeper. He went on to play several characters from Chutki’s family, including a colourful mother with a sharp tongue, an innocent brother and a wide-eyed boyfriend. Gera set the blueprint which has spawned a trend of men combining lipstick with slapstick.
