Centre stage: A winter theatre calendar
Editor’s note: The splainer team has put together a list of the best theatre coming your way this season, from musical specials to adaptations to intimate interactive experiences. Check out our winter theatre calendar for performances you must catch in Mumbai, Delhi, Pune, Bengaluru, and Kolkata.
Written by: Mekhala Singhal
*****
MUMBAI
Have you ever imagined what it might take to build the Taj Mahal today? And not just in terms of sheer labour strength or financial wealth, but the hoops you would have to jump through, the people you would have to convince, the red tape you would have to cross in order for the project to even lift up off the ground? This absurd premise forms the narrative of ‘Taj Mahal Ka Tender', a hilarious production that looks at all the bureaucratic nonsense Shah Jahan has to put up with. The question remains: Will the Taj Mahal get built today, or is it an impossible endeavour?
When: November 24
Where: St Andrews Auditorium
What does it mean to be an artist? What does it mean to be a human being? How do we keep going when life keeps throwing obstacles in our way? ‘It Is What It Is’, a one-man performance by Akshay Gandhi, tackles these knotty questions, taking the audience on a journey through philosophical self-interrogation.
When: November 25–26
Where: Rangshila Theatre
This show consists of stories that unfold in two languages at once, incorporating the source language with a ‘bridge’ language that makes it accessible to a contemporary audience. ‘Qissebaazi’ is a storytelling endeavour created by Danish Hussain, meant to showcase the diversity of languages in the subcontinent and bring together tales from different cultures and communities in an exciting new format.
When: November 28
Where: The Cube, NMACC
Eklavya is an exceptional archer, who wants, more than anything else in the world, to be taught by the revered Guru Dronacharya. However, Dronacharya refuses to teach anyone but the princely castes, let alone someone like Eklavya, who belongs to a forest-dwelling family. This modern retelling of the age-old tale from the Mahabharata brings to light the caste hierarchies that exist throughout our legends and stories, and which get reproduced even today.
When: November 28–29
Where: NCPA
A traumatic brain injury turns Mia’s dad’s whole life upside, and with it, her life too. But she is determined to find a cure, something that will lead her to a solution that will help. She throws herself into the world of medicine and neuroscience and, somewhere along the way, is forced to confront the realities of what her own mental health and brain are like.
Part of NCPA’s annual theatre festival, Connections, now in its fourth year, this play—originally titled ‘Brain Play’—has been translated into Hindi for an Indian audience.
When: December 5
Where: Bal Gandharva Rang Mandir
PUNE
When a play is written by Duncan Macmillan, it’s hard not to love everything about it. ‘Every Brilliant Thing’ is a popular production which has been performed in over 80 countries, with performances by renowned actors such as Daniel Radcliffe and Mariska Hargitay. An immersive, interactive show told by a singular narrator, the show is carried by the leading voice, but is nothing without the participation of audience members, which can vary with each show.
It doesn’t shy away from the realities of depression and mental illness—instead, it pulls the audience into the story and reminds them of the things that matter. That is, every brilliant thing.
When: November 22–26
Where: Mukt Theater
DELHI NCR
Staging Shakespeare in India almost always carries with it a sense of dissonance—a distance between two cultures and peoples that feels insurmountable. This show, however, takes that divide into consideration and brings Shakespeare to us without ignoring the differences between the bard’s world and ours. Still asking the questions that the protagonist brings up in its original format, of power, legacy, and authority—and who gets to have it—acclaimed French director Habib Naghmouchin situates the timeless of King Lear in an Indian context.
When: November 27–29
Where: Shri Ram Centre for Performing Arts
‘Tax Free’, while originally written and performed in Marathi, has been translated into and performed in several other Indian languages, cementing its pace as one of the foremost one-act Indian plays we have. Four visually impaired men decide to start a Blind Men’s club and, in the process, are confronted with situations that reflect the honest meaning of life, friendship, and the human experience through wit and humour, reminding the audience the importance of recognising what truly matters.
When: November 28
Where: Akshara Theatre
The story of Manu and the fish highlights the value of compassion and care for all living creatures—King Manu finds a fish in the river near his home, and the fish begs Manu to save him from the fate of being eaten. Manu takes the fish, rehomes it as it grows, and re-releases it into the ocean, only to find out that the fish was actually Lord Vishnu.
In this modern retelling, Mia is a young refugee who finds herself washed up on the shores of a foreign land with her sister. As the world experiences a climate emergency and a devastating heatwave, Mia befriends a fish, whom she cares for and nurtures. She names the fish Samaki, who in turn becomes the key to her survival in a world that seems to be deteriorating around her.
When: December 4
Where: British Council
Grief is at the heart of this poignant production featuring Manav Kaul, as the protagonist reckons with the death of his mother. In a daze, unsteady, he heads to the airport. He looks back at his conversations with her. He thinks of all her dreams and ambitions in life. He tries to make sense of it all. “Maybe,” wrote Youth Ki Awaaz about ‘Traasadi’, “it had to take a one-man-show to remind me that a magnum opus can just as well be something small, something simple, something tender instead.”
When: December 5
Where: Little Theatre Group Auditorium
Catch it before it’s gone!
A satirical comedy that tackles the failings of the education system head-on, ‘The Teachers’ centres around an ex-student who returns to his old school. He insists that his schooling and education did not prepare him for life in the real world, and he demands that the teachers in the school re-take his exams as a test to see if they are capable and qualified. And if they aren’t—a full refund for him. That’s the premise of this funny, sarcastic, and sometimes too-real play by Ram Vishal.
When: November 14
Where: Lok Kala Manch
BENGALURU
Pintu Bhaiya is the voice of the voiceless in this solo, one-act play by Nihal Parashar. We see this larger-than-life character, the titular ‘Patna ka superhero’, through the eyes of an innocent little boy from Patna in the early 2000s, in a nostalgic recreation of a forgotten past. Stories of love, bitter feuds, and small-town idiosyncrasies drive the narrative here; it is, per Mumbai Theatre Guide, “a reminder of all that was lost in making a metro city home.”
When: November 19–22
Where: Ranga Shankara Theatre
The corporate rat race gets to us all in the end. Set in the smoking area of an office building, ‘Dhumrapaan’, or ‘Smoking’, follows a group of employees in an office who congregate in the smoking room to talk and mingle. They discuss both work-related things like appraisals and meetings, as well as personal information such as relationships and politics. Another comedy to add to your list, this play asks of us what exactly it is that we subject ourselves—and our lungs—to in order to survive.
When: November 21
Where: Ranga Shankara Theatre
Originally written in 1915, against the backdrop of World War I, this play examines the roles of women during wartime, especially the women left behind as the men went off to war. It argues that, as people continue to glorify the violence and destruction of war, it is women who bear the brunt of it. The play has been translated and adapted into Kannada for an Indian audience.
When: December 2
Where: Ranga Shankara Theatre
KOLKATA
This one’s the work of stalwarts of the theatre world, with Mahesh Dattani the writer and Lilette Dubey directing. Jairaj and Ratna, two Bharatnatyam dancers whose glory days remain firmly in the past now, have a gifted daughter, Lata, who’s on the verge of breaking through as a dancer. The play explores the family dynamics and the many struggles of the parents as Dattani’s story tackles ideas of identity and gender through the family dynamics at play here against the backdrop of the world of dance.
When: November 29, 2026
Where: Gyan Manch
Gauhar Jaan, perhaps India’s first celebrity singer, was born in Azamgarh to a family of Armenian descent. Popularly known as the Gramophone Girl, she recorded over 600 songs in her lifetime, in several languages—Hindi, Bengali, Pashto, and French, to name a few. Her story is told through this play, a solo musical theatre piece directed by director Abanti Chakraborty, and starring Arpita Chatterjee.
When: December 19, 2026
Where: GD Birla Sabhagar
Rather than re-tell the original myth, ‘Oedipus’ takes on a different—and thrilling—perspective. Under strange and unsettling circumstances, a young man and an older woman meet and develop a bond. Set in contemporary times, and using the Greek myth as a starting point, the play interrogates the fractures in human society, the impact of communal conflict and prejudice, and the complexities of identity, intimacy, and social conditioning.
When: January 10, 2027
Where: Padatik Theatre
*****
Mekhala Singhal is Assistant Editor at Advisory.
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