Vodafone Essar unveils theatre fest in Kolkata

Vodafone Essar, one of India?s leading cellular service providers, has unveiled the 10th edition of Vodafone Odeon ? a week long theatre festival in Kolkata.

Present at the occasion was Sridhar Rao, CEO Vodafone Essar East Limited along with eminent theatre artists like Usha Ganguly, Pramita Mullick, Ananda Lal, Mir A Ali, Sujoy Prosad Chatterjee, Abhijit Sen, Saswati Guha Thakurta, Debashish Raychaudhuri, Mr Sekhar Samaddar, Suchita Raychowdhury, Aloknanda Roy, Sasha Ghoshal and Dev Shankar Halder.

Odeon begins on November 27 and continues till December 5.

The festival will showcase two outstation productions (Kuch Bhi Ho Sakta Hain by Feroz Abbas Khan featuring Anupam Kher and Tina Johnson?s Out of Bounds featuring Rajesh Gopie) and seven city productions featuring prominent names from the theatre world.

Like previous years, this year too there will be an ensemble of English, Bengali and Hindi plays staged across various venues in the city.

Apart from the contemporary plays, the festival will feature five plays from world bard Rabindranath Tagore to mark the 150th year of his birth centenary.

Commenting on the launch, Sridhar Rao, CEO Vodafone Essar East Limited said, ?Kolkata and theatre are two inseparable entities, and we are delighted to present the 10th year of the Vodafone Odeon theatre festival. Over the years Odeon has become an important landmark in the cultural calendar of the city providing a unique and vibrant theatre experience and promoting art and culture amongst the citizens of Kolkata.?

Odeon this year will open with Anupam Kher?s Hindi play ?Kuch Bhi Ho Sakta Hain?, directed and designed by Feroz Abbas Khan, which is an autobiography of the actor dramatized for the first time on stage.

The play features Anupam Kher recounting his life, his struggles, joys and tears. It is a play that celebrates life and reaches out to all with honesty and candour.

The second Mumbai production is Tina Johnson?s ?Out of Bounds?, it is set in South Africa during the time of Apartheid. Written and scripted by Durban based playwright, actor and producer Rajesh Gopie, it narrates the story of Lal an Indian boy.

?Out of Bounds? is not merely a play about Indians in South Africa, it?s about every individual who have questioned themselves about who they are and where they belong.

Subsequently there are two Bandage productions directed by Mir A Ali which includes a multilingual and an English play and the last five plays of the festival on Tagore?s work includes Mayar Khela, Chandalika, Arup Ratan, Gora and Raja.