S. Shakthidharan News

​Adelaide Festival Centre CEO Kate Gould has hit the ground running as a bold new chapter for the iconic venue begins. Learn more about the changes to the venue here!

Victoria’s theatre industry came together on Monday May 5th at the Comedy Theatre to reveal the winners for the 2025 Green Room Awards and the recipients are still celebrating. Learn more here!

Following the runaway success of S. Shakthidharan’s critically-acclaimed epics Counting and Cracking and The Jungle and the Sea, Belvoir will present the world-premiere of The Wrong Gods.

RISING, Melbourne’s winter festival of new art, music and performance, has announced its 2025 program featuring; 65 events, 327 artists, 15 new commissions, 9 world premieres, 5 Australian and 10 Victorian.

The Public Theater will present the final New York City encore presentation of Elevator Repair Service's critically acclaimed GATZ based on The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. More than a decade after the last time the epic played at The Public, the production will once again bring this creative retelling of a classic to a new generation of audiences.

The Public Theater has announced two additional new musicals that will be part of The Public’s Spring 2025 and Fall 2025 seasons at their landmark Astor Place home on 425 Lafayette Street. The new musicals include GODDESS and THE SEAT OF OUR PANTS.

Last night, September 12, The Public Theater and NYU Skirball celebrated the Opening Night of Belvoir St Theatre’s COUNTING AND CRACKING, a Sri Lankan-Australian epic written and associate directed by S. Shakthidharan and directed and associate written by Eamon Flack making its North American debut at NYU Skirball. See photos from opening night!

The Public Theater will begin performances for the New York premiere of GOOD BONES, written by Pulitzer Prize winner James Ijames. The production has been extended. Learn more and see how to purchase tickets.

Melbourne Theatre Company has announced thirteen world-class stage productions for its 2025 season. From classic plays to international hits and world premieres to works that could only have been made in Melbourne, audiences are invited to immerse themselves in stories that ask them to think, feel and reflect in a season that bridges the familiar with the unexpected.

The Public Theater will present COUNTING AND CRACKING, a powerful Sri Lankan-Australian play exploring themes of family, migration, and identity. Learn how to purchase tickets.

The Public Theater has announced casting for the long-anticipated New York premiere of GOOD BONES written by Pulitzer Prize winner James Ijames and directed by Public Theater Associate Artistic Director/Resident Director Saheem Ali.

 NYU Skirball’s Fall 2024 season will open on Friday, September 6 with the North American premiere of Counting and Cracking, a two-week run co-presented with The Public Theater. Learn more about the season here!

The Public Theater has revealed the line-up for The Public’s 2024-25 Season. See full programming and learn how to purchase tickets.

RISING, the premier festival of new art, music, and performance in the heart of Melbourne today unveils a centrepiece of its 2024 program: S.Shakthidharan's acclaimed Sri Lankan-Australian saga Counting and Cracking, co-presented with University of Melbourne Arts and Culture at the new Union Theatre.

Raghuvir Joshi’s international debut feature ‘Sahela’ executive produced by Dev Payel is set to make its South Asia premiere at Jio MAMI Mumbai International Film Festival 2023. Inspired by real events, the film explores the challenges faced by a married couple when the husband comes out as gay.

Belvoir has announced the productions that will make up its next season. 2024 at Belvoir will see ten plays with something for everyone – from best-selling book adaptations, returns of incredible work, a 25A show being brought to the mainstage for the first time, a remount of Counting and Cracking, and so much more. Learn more about the season here!

The winners of the 2022 Sydney Theatre Awards were announced on 23 January 2023 at a star-studded ceremony, with 30 Awards presented, shared between 18 productions which played on Sydney stages during 2022. Over 500 members of the Sydney theatre community gathered at the York Theatre, Seymour Centre to celebrate.

Pilot Theatre has announced that from September it will be touring their award-winning 2019 production of Sabrina Mahfouz's exciting adaptation of Malorie Blackman's critically acclaimed young adult novel of first love in a dangerous fictional dystopia – Noughts & Crosses.

Pilot Theatre has today released production images for the world premiere of S. Shakthidharan (Counting and Cracking, Sydney Festival) adaptation of Zana Fraillon’s award winning book The Bone Sparrow.

This March, the Belgrade Theatre presents the brand new stage adaptation of The Bone Sparrow as part of their Coventry UK City of Culture 2021 programme, running in B2 from Tues 22 – Sat 26 March.