VIDEO: First Look at Madhuri Shekar's A NICE INDIAN BOY at Olney Theatre Center in March
Previews began Wednesday, March 8, and the show will run through Sunday, April 9, 2023.
Get a first look at A Nice Indian Boy by Madhuri Shekar and directed by Zi Alikhan having its regional premiere in Olney Theatre Center's Mulitz-Gudelsky Theatre Lab in a production featuring the work of one of the fastest rising and prolific American Playwrights working. The production is scheduled to run through Sunday, April 9, 2023. Tickets are $54-$79 and available online at olneytheatre.org or at 301-924-3400.
Playwright Madhuri Shekar has proven herself a master of multiple genres since her first play In Love and Warcraft premiered at Atlanta's Alliance Theatre in 2014. Her writing has tackled video games, horror, science, historical drama, and science fiction. With A Nice Indian Boy, Shekar is firmly in the mold of the great American kitchen sink dramas, leavened by a good dose of comedy. A meet-cute at the local temple brings Naveen (Carol Mazhuvancheril) face-to-face with the man of his dreams: a fellow Marathi-speaking Hindu who loves the same Bollywood films and can cook a mean dal makhani. If his parents (Lynette Rathnam and Abhimanyu Katyal) were ever going to accept him bringing home a boyfriend, Keshav (Noah Israel) would be that boy except - he's white, raised by Indian foster parents who adopted him. But they're madly in-love and so off they head to the Gavaskar house, where Naveen's white boyfriend isn't the only surprise ready to walk through the door. That additional surprise comes in the form of Naveen's sister, Arundhathi (Jessica Jain) fleeing her own, more traditional marriage. Surasree Das, Shaan Sharma, and Taylor Witt serve as production swings and understudies.
Says director Zi Alikhan, "A Nice Indian Boy is a play that immediately felt like 'home' to me-a South Asian-American story that is fundamentally an American story, one that centers on family, generational progress, and love in all its forms. I'm unbelievably excited to find out how, through this play, Olney can be a home to so many folks for whom this story is extremely familiar and to situate the Gavaskar family in the canon of families that have graced the stages here for the last ninety years.'
On the creative team, Ambika Raina serves as both the Choreographer and Assistant Director; Frank Oliva is the scenic designer, and Danielle Preston the costume designer; Kenny Neal is the sound designer, and lights are designed by Emma Deane. Olney Theatre's Director of Community Engagement, Shruthi Mukund, serves as a cultural consultant and Hope Villanueva is the production stage manager.
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