Review by Talia Carl­isle.

A wise man once told me that real loves grows, and so does my love of Indi­an Ink’s now legendary tale of Krishnan’s Dairy that wound up its final sea­son in Wel­ling­ton this week.

The pro­duc­tion is a well pol­ished gem in the crown of cre­at­ive team Jac­ob Rajan and Justin Lewis, which I first saw at Wellington’s Han­nah Play­house 10 years ago and have been cap­tiv­ated by ever since.

Their latest and last sea­son found its home at Te Papa’s Sound­ings Theatre and was just as mag­ni­fi­cent, hil­ari­ous and heart-wrench­ing as I remem­ber. Added to this was the per­fectly cho­reo­graphed sound design, cre­at­ive props, catchy songs and their infam­ously magic­al mask wiz­ardry that brought our favour­ite dairy and char­ac­ters to life.

There are many legends in this tale of an immig­rant dairy own­er named Gobi – all of whom are played by Rajan and weave in Gobi’s love story with his wife Zina – in with that of the Indi­an Emper­or and vis­ion­ary romantic, Shah Jahan, who is respons­ible for the fam­ous Taj Mahal.

It com­pares their recent arranged mar­riage with the pro­spect of a love mar­riage, all while set­tling into new life and par­ent­hood in the prized sub­urbs of New Zea­l­and… which is not the para­dise Zina ima­gined it to be.

The per­sever­ance of their rela­tion­ship – and of their shop that earns them $4 an hour on a good day with­in a 17-hour shift – is noth­ing com­pared to the per­sever­ing strength of the Indi­an Ink Com­pany. which has itself hon­oured New Zea­l­and as its home for 25 years, des­pite receiv­ing rap­tur­ous applause and 65 suc­cess­ful over­seas tours dur­ing that time.

Their love story, both Gobi’s and Rajan’s, will not be for­got­ten and I am ready to love the new works by these mas­ter­ful cre­at­ors that are already on their way to inspire new audi­ences like myself.

I am not ready to let go of Gobi and Zina yet, but their impact will stay in my heart, and in the shad­ows of Te Papa where this breath­tak­ing mas­ter­piece is appro­pri­ately worthy of a long awaited rest.

I don’t see any rest in sight for its cre­at­ors how­ever, and I couldn’t be hap­pi­er about that.