Gingold Theatrical Group is presenting SPEAKER'S CORNER Writers Group. This season, writers Aeneas Sagar Hemphill, Divya Mangwani, Marcus Scott and Mallory Jane Weiss are developing works in response to prompts from the revolutionary activist humanitarian writings and precepts of George Bernard Shaw.
Sharifa Yasmin sharifayasmin.com
Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation has named Sharifa Yasmin the inaugural recipient of the Barbara Whitman Award.
Established by producer Whitman, the award recognizes a female, trans, or non-binary early-career director who has demonstrated a unique vision in their work with a $10,000 cash prize.
Finalists were directors Ty Defoe, Miranda Haymon, Tara Moses, Aya Ogawa, Tatiana Pandiani, and Mei Ann Teo.
Yasmin said, Being a part of trans and Arab American communities, we are so often told that we donât matterâthat our voices are insignificant. I became a director to change what stories are being told, to uplift voices that are so often silenced, to tell myself and my communities that we are here and we deserve to be heard. This award is life-changing for me in that endeavor, both in the recognition of my labor and in the support that enables me to continue this work. I am profoundly grate
East West Players in partnership with San Francisco's EnActe Arts and New York City's Hypokrit Productions will present the virtual world premiere of The Sitayana (Or “How to Make an Exit”), by Lavina Jadhwani.
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Recently, I had an unusually exciting Friday night. While frantically switching between recipes for chicken curry and chocolate chai affogato, I smelled something burning. The culprit: the paper tabs on the Lipton tea bags that I’d added to a pot of boiling water for the chai. Apparently, I wasn’t supposed to let them dangle over the side as evidenced by the fact that they were on fire.
Crisis was, fortunately, averted. On my laptop screen, a dashing fortysomething was completing the same tasks without breaking a sweat. I was watching “Bollywood Kitchen,” an interactive performance co-produced by the Geffen Playhouse, in Los Angeles, and New York’s Hypokrit Theatre Company. The man onscreen was Sri Rao, an Indian-American screenwriter and the author of a 2017 cookbook of the same name, which collects his family’s recipes and pairs them with Bollywood films.
Sri Rao in
Bollywood Kitchen Kyle Rosenberg
Cooking and theatre are a natural pair. Whether itâs a flip of a pan, the flash of fire, or the fast-talking chef behind it all, theatricality is just par for the course (pun intended).
So when Geffen Playhouse found Sri Rao, a filmmaker and cookbook author of
Bollywood Kitchen, they knew a partnership had to be forged. Now, the digital theatrical experience is running as part of Geffen Stayhouse, the Los Angeles theatreâs virtual programming created in the middle of a pandemic.
Led by Rao, the show invites audiences to partake in a culinary journey from India to America as he (and ticketholders) cook dishes like chicken curry, Bollywood popcorn, and a chocolate chai affogato. Opening January 23, the show has been extended through March 6.