Kritarth Srinivasan is a familiar name in the comedy scene in India today. Hailing from a defence background, he never had a steady hometown or school which gave him a huge identity crisis — the name of his special show.
Now, Kritarth along with three other comedians from the city — Vamsidhar Bhogaraju, Siddharth Banerjee and Satish Perumal have come together to form a comedy group of sorts called The Puncher Shop which is all set to showcase their performance at Alliance Francaise on August 13.
The 24-year-old has been in the scene for four years now! “My dad was in aviation, I was brainwashed to join the same field at a really young age — so much so that I flew a Microlight plane with my dad at the age of 16!” So how did he make the jump from aviation to comedy?
“At 19, signed up to be a part of Vir Das’s comedy contest, just to get into a free show, and recited some lame jokes on stage. But that got me interested and I started attending open mics to try out new material,” says Kritarth, who quit engineering to pursue comedy.
“Surprisingly, it wasn’t very hard to convince my parents because I was terrible at Math. They were only worried that I wouldn’t be able to support myself, so now every few months, I gift them something expensive, just to put their fears to rest,” he admits sheepishly.
From being booed at a show to performing a range of houseful shows across the country, Kritarth has certainly come a long way. “I was going through my high school scrapbook and most comments were about how I cracked really bad jokes. They were sad PJs,” he recollects.
“Now, I keep my humour relatable without trying to be intellectual or political,” admits Kritarth who believes he is quite disciplined! “While other kids got beaten up if they didn’t eat, I got beaten if I didn’t say good morning when answering the phone. Sometimes, I can still hear my dad yelling at me when I receive a call,” laughs one-fourth of The Puncher Shop.
“The four of us began our journey in comedy almost at the same time and have been writing together from the beginning and have always ended up performing together across various venues,” he says in conclusion about how the group was formed.
