Opening Doorz

By Our Correspondent | Opening Doorz Editorial | February 20, 2017

Three months ago, Vidushi Mehra left an indelible mark in Bollywood with debutant director Munish Bhardwaj’s tense and disturbing ‘thriller’ Moh Maya Money. Playing Bhavna, a young, pregnant wife, looking for her missing husband, Vidushi tore through from the screen onto the viewer’s psyche depicting her pain, anger and hopelessness with a performance that would have even Robert De Niro stand up and applaud!

A former banker, Vidushi holds an MBA in marketing and finance from the United States of America. She had a successful run of the corporate world for little over a decade. A musician, theatre artist, film actor and entrepreneur, Vidushi Mehra has performed in over 45 productions on stage and received glowing reviews for each of her roles. Vidushi made her international stage debut in 2015, to packed theatres in Europe.

Speaking about her performance in MMM, Vidushi is skeptical. “The film did not have a large reach as it had a few screenings. I don’t know how many of the bigwigs in the industry actually saw it. But whoever saw it, liked it,” she says as she prepares for her play Skylight, which is back on popular demand in the capital. There will be shows on February 24 and 25 with two shows on February 26—a matinee show at 4 pm and an evening show at 8 pm.

Skylight is produced by Vidushi who also plays a pivotal role in the play. “This play was written by a famous British playwright David Hare and the first show was held in London in 1990,” reveals the feisty actress.

Skylight is a contemporary love story between an older man and a younger woman—Tom and Kyra. Both meet after a separation of three years. Tom wants Kyra back in his life, but Kyra has moved on. A conversation about their past, their love, their ideology, class, politics and education lays the foundation for their fundamental biases.

“Previously Skylight managed to get a fair amount of celebrity endorsement as well as well as substantial media coverage with the top brass of journals and publications. Our endeavor is to revive theatre in Delhi, make it enjoyable yet commercially viable for the audiences as well as the production. Skylight did benchmark a standard of quality and became a resounding success story in our city,” states Vidushi, who intends to come to Mumbai after the play to meet a few prominent casting directors.

Throwing light on her aspirations for Bollywood, Vidushi, who also played a prominent part in No One Killed Jessica and Saat Khoon Maaf, among others, says, “I have been doing the rounds over the years but it has been challenging as I live in Delhi.” Hopefully, Skylight might just propel her to the skies!

Profile of other members of the cast:

Samar Sarila, Tom Sergeant
Samar Sarila (born in Tripoli, Libya) has a BA in Political Science and History from SOAS, University of London. His passion for the stage was evident from an early age. He wrote, produced and directed his first play at the Burton Taylor, Oxford in 1997, aged 16. He cast his friends in the play and sourced furniture and props from friends. He says that it was a tremendous learning experience, “guerilla theatre” as he fondly calls it. He went on to act in Doug Lucie’s seminal play ‘Grace’ while at University in London. He later moved to Paris and assisted and acted in two productions: Tennessee Williams’ ‘A Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’ and David Mamet’s ‘American Buffalo’, both in French. Some of the plays he acted in include The Cherry Orchard, Romeo and Juliet and The Zoo Story.

In Mumbai Samar did two plays: Raell Padamsee’s ‘Murder on the Menu’ which toured the country for a year in 2008-09 and Henrik Ibsen’s ‘Hedda Gabbler’ which opened in Bangalore and was later staged at the Prithvi Theatre and at the NCPA in Mumbai (2010-11). Having moved back to Delhi last year, he hopes that Skylight is the first of many stage productions.

Daanish Sood, Edward Sergeant
An economics graduate from Ramjas College, Delhi University, Daanish is a musician, theatre artist and an aspiring actor who has actively participated in stage and street plays at various festivals. Daanish has also lent his face to many brands including Vodafone, Dominos, Amazon, Truly Madly and many others. As for his music, he has composed for various short films.

Tickets for the show are available on http://www.insider.in