Mulk Raj Anand was an Indian writer in English, recognised for his depiction of the lives of the poorer class in the traditional Indian society. One of the pioneers of Indo-Anglian fiction, he, together with R. K. Narayan, Ahmad Ali and Raja Rao, was one of the first India-based writers in English to gain an International readership. Anand is admired for his novels and short stories, which have acquired the status of classics of modern Indian English literature; they are noted for their perceptive insight into the lives of the oppressed and for their analysis of impoverishment, exploitation and misfortune. He became known for his protest novel Untouchable (1935), which was followed by other works on the Indian poor such as Coolie (1936) and Two Leaves and a Bud (1937). He is also noted for being among the first writers to incorporate Punjabi and Hindustani idioms into English, and was a recipient of the civilian honour of the Padma Bhushan, the third-highest civilian award in the Republic of India.
Henry Woolf was a British actor, theatre director, and teacher of acting, drama and theatre who lived in Canada. He was a longtime friend and collaborator of 2005 Nobel Laureate Harold Pinter, having stimulated Pinter to write his first play, The Room (1957), in 1956. Woolf served as a faculty member at the University of Saskatchewan from 1983 to 1997 and as artistic director of Shakespeare on the Saskatchewan from 1991 until 2001.
Amol Palekar is an Indian actor, director and producer of Hindi and Marathi cinema.
Prithviraj Kapoor was an Indian actor who is also considered to be one of the founding figures of Hindi cinema. He was associated with IPTA as one of its founding members and established the Prithvi Theatres in 1944 as a travelling theatre company based in Bombay.
Michael Vivian Fyfe Pennington is an English actor, director and writer. Together with director Michael Bogdanov, he founded the English Shakespeare Company in 1986 and was its Joint Artistic Director until 1992. He has written ten books, directed in the UK, US, Romania and Japan, and is an Honorary Associate Artist of the Royal Shakespeare Company. He is best known for his role as Moff Jerjerrod in the original Star Wars trilogy film Return of the Jedi.
Mita Vashisht is an Indian actress. Known for her work on screen, stage and television, she has played a wide range of roles. Her most prominent appearances includes; sci-fi television series Space City Sigma (1989-1991), Pachpan Khambe Laal Deewarein, Swabhimaan, Devyani in Kuch Khatti Kuch Meethi,Alaan (Kirdaar) to Trishna in Kahani Ghar Ghar Ki and Jethi Maa in Kaala Teeka to film roles with a wide spectrum of directors with different cinema styles.
Theatre of India is one of the most ancient forms of theatre and it features a detailed textual, sculptural, and dramatic effects which emerged in mid first millennium BC. Like in the areas of music and dance, the Indian theatre is also defined by the dramatic performance based on the concept of Nritya, which is a Sanskrit word for drama but encompasses dramatic narrative, virtuosic dance, and music. Historically, Indian theatre has exerted influence beyond its borders, reaching ancient China and other countries in the Far East.
Amritlal Nagar was one of the prominent Hindi writers of the twentieth century.
Lillete Dubey is an Indian actress and theatre director. She has worked in Indian and international theatre, television and films in Hindi and English languages. Dubey began her career with Barry John in Delhi and was the founding member of his group - Theatre Action Group in 1973. In 1991 she set up her own theatre company - The Primetime Theatre Company.
Bharatendu Academy of Dramatic Arts or Bharatendu Natya Akademi is a theatre training institute in Lucknow, India. It is named after Bharatendu Harishchandra, father of Hindi theatre. It offers a two-year full-time diploma course in theatre training. It is an autonomous organisation under the Ministry of Culture, Government of Uttar Pradesh.
Tokyo International Players, also known as TIP, is the oldest, largest English-language theatre group in Japan and is among the oldest in Asia. TIP productions range from classics to musicals to contemporary and original pieces, in venues including Theater Sun-mall Shinjuku, Ebisu Echo Theater, Nakano Pocket Square, and Our Space in Hatagaya.
Shyamanand Jalan was a Kolkata-based Indian theatre director, and actor. He is credited for the renaissance period of modern Indian theatre and especially the Hindi theatre in Kolkata from the 1960s to 1980s. He was the first to perform modernist Mohan Rakesh, starting with Ashadh Ka Ek Din in 1960 and in the coming years bridged the gap between Hindi theatre and Bengali theatre, by mounting Hindi productions of works by Bengali playwrights, like Badal Sircar's Evam Indrajit (1968) and Pagla Ghora (1971), which in turn introduced Sircar to rest of the country. In 2005, he directed his first and only film Eashwar Mime Co., which was an adaptation of Dibyendu Palit's story, Mukhabhinoy, by Vijay Tendulkar.
Dinesh Thakur was an Indian theatre director, actor in theatre, television and Hindi film, where most notably he appeared as one of the leads in Rajnigandha 1974 and directed by Basu Chatterjee, which won both Filmfare Best Movie Award and the Filmfare Critics Award for Best Movie. Dinesh Thakur was born in 1947 in Jaipur, Rajasthan, India. He was the founder-director of ANK productions, a Mumbai-based theatre company, established in 1976.
Mohan Rakesh was one of the pioneers of the Nai Kahani literary movement of the Hindi literature in India in the 1950s. He wrote the first modern Hindi play, Ashadh Ka Ek Din (1958), which won a competition organised by the Sangeet Natak Akademi. He made significant contributions to the novel, the short story, travelogue, criticism, memoir and drama. Mohan Rakesh's Aadhe-adhure is one of the most significant plays about urbanmiddle class family and poignantly projects the transition of values in the changing urban scenario in India. He was awarded the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 1968.
Hindi theatre is theatre performed in the Hindi language, including dialects such as Braj Bhasha, Khari Boli and Hindustani. Hindi theatre is produced mainly in North India, and some parts of West India and Central India, which include Mumbai and Bhopal. Hindi theatre has its roots in the traditional folk theatre of North India, like Ram lila and Raslila, and also influenced by distant Sanskrit drama. Starting with Bhartendu Harishchandra in the late 19th century and subsequent playwrights like Jaishankar Prasad, Mohan Rakesh, Hindi theatre came of age in the 1940s and 50s, when IPTA movement created a new brand of theatre practitioners in Hindi speaking areas, especially with IPTA Mumbai, Prithvi Theatres of thespian Prithviraj Kapoor, and theatre artiste Habib Tanvir, paving way for next generation of artists who came out once National School of Drama, Delhi started functioning in 1959.
Khaled Choudhury was a theatre personality and artist of Bengal. He worked for various directors of both Bengali and Hindi plays, including Sombhu Mitra, Tripti Mitra, and Shyamanand Jalan in various capacities — creating the Stage, sets and costumes and later as music director. He was a bachelor. He has been awarded the Padma Bhushan for his contribution to theatre in India's Republic Day Honours List on 26 January 2012. He died on 30 April 2014 in Kolkata.
Naunihal is a 1967 Indian Hindi-language drama film directed by Raj Marbros starring Sanjeev Kumar, Balraj Sahni and Indrani Mukherjee in lead roles. The film's music was composed by Madan Mohan, with lyrics by Kaifi Azmi, including the song "Meri Aawaz Suno Pyar ka Raaz Suno" sung by Mohammad Rafi. The song is picturized over the funeral procession of Prime Minister of India, Jawahar Lal Nehru.
Raj Bisaria was an Indian director, producer, actor and educationalist, described by the Press Trust of India as "the father of the modern theatre in North India". He founded Theatre Arts Workshop in 1966, and Bhartendu Academy of Dramatic Arts in 1975 and the repertory company of Bhartendu Academy of Dramatic Arts in 1980. He blended artistic concepts of the East and the West, and the traditional and the modern.
Pali Chandra, is a Kathak Exponent, Choreographer, Digital Dance Educator, Mentor and artistic director. Intensively trained in the field of Kathak, she now propagates Dance Education through various channels. She has established several studios specialising in Kathak Training Programs in the United Kingdom, United Arab Emirates, India and Switzerland. She has directed 14 Art Festivals in various continents. She is the co-founder for the portal learnkathakonline and Course Director of Kathak for natyasutraonline with Invis Multimedia.
Brijeshwar Singh, is a writer, poet and theatre promoter based in Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh, India. His patronage and promotion of theatre through the Rang Vinayak Rang Mandal theatre repertoire and the annual theatre festival being organized in his own Windermere Theatre earned him the U.P. Sangeet Natak Academy award for 2020. His Daya Drishti Charitable Trust helps children born with thalassemia avail regular and lifesaving transfusions. His second book 'Next Patient, Please' was released on 26 March 2022. He was featured among top 75 personalities of Rohilkhand region of Uttar Pradesh by Amar Ujala. The list was published on the 75th foundation day of the newspaper.