Madras Week: When Boomi & Friends brought Kodambakkam alive

Well, as you know, the Green Park show did not end with the craft workshop. No sooner had the children posed for the flashing cameras, holding aloft their attractive lanterns, than it was time for Bommi and her friends to come to Dazzleland, Kodambakkam in this case.

A few words about Bommi. Bommi and Friends is an original 3D animation IP (intellectual property) targeted at children of pre-school age, up to nine years. Production of the first season of 13 episodes for television is complete, and the telecast is likely to commence early 2011. The series has been created for children worldwide. In many ways, Bommi owes her existence to ace storytellers Jeeva Raghunath and Nandini Sridhar. Together, they developed the character. Image Venture, which owns the IP, developed the image and character of the girl and named her Bommi.

In the open lobby, despite all the colour Bommi and her friends brought to public view, there were patches of disorder and onlookers found it a bit difficult to connect the Bommi act with the images running on screen from yesteryear Tamil films a distance away from the performance.

The Madras or Chennai connection begins with Bommi visiting Dazzleland (Kodambakkam). So enthused is she by Kollywood, she calls her friends along and together they revisit scenes from the past as well as of the present.

Coordinating the show as only she can, Jeeva was in my view the star of the programme. But let the kids take it – they did a marvelous job. And it must not have been easy acting when almost the whole of Green Park was watching.

Kudos to the organisers of the show, Binita and Shrimati of Spring into Reading, for pulling it off yet again. And to Mathiseelan and Senthilkumar who attended the show with their families and distributed goodies to all the participants. They, along with Sivayogen, run Image Venture.

Pictures show Jeeva in her elements as she addresses the cast; the actors are all too excited to be coming on stage; Siddharth freaking out as he dances to a popular Kamal Hassan number; Bommi smiling as Jeeva introduces the stars – Thangavelu, Ajit, Sri Devi and Vijay; and children and parents watching expectantly.