NCPA adds yet another feather to its cap with the retelling of Agatha Christie’s popular novel, ‘The Mirror Crack’d’, which has been adapted for the stage by Rachel Wagstaff and reimagined for an Indian audience by Ayeesha Menon. Proud to bring a play of such global stature to the NCPA, visionary Chairman of NCPA, Khushroo Suntook, says, “The NCPA is delighted to offer the celebrated production of ‘The Mirror Crack’d’ with an utterly original Indian flavour. This interpretation is a great example of our ambition for NCPA productions – creating innovative content in collaboration with the very best artists in India as well as globally. Our audiences can look forward to a terrific evening’s entertainment in what promises to be the highlight of Mumbai theatre calendar in 2020!”

Creative producer, Pádraig Cusack said he was thrilled to work on a classic Agatha Christie novel, transposing it to India, collaborating with a whole range of incredible artists from India and the UK to create an utterly unique interpretation of this marvelous ‘whodunnit’ story. “Bringing together the skills and resources of the NCPA, Wales Millennium Centre and Wiltshire Creative feels like the best kind of artistic partnership which audiences in Mumbai will be the first to experience,” he says.

Melly Still, who created the original production in the UK, shared, “I’m thrilled to work in Mumbai with an extraordinary group of Indian actors and artists to create an Indian version of this wonderful Agatha Christie whodunnit which I hope will have both the Christie fans as well as new audiences keen for an intriguing thriller on the edge of their seats, trying to second guess every twist and turn of this cleverly plotted story.”

An NCPA Production of the Wales Millennium Centre and Wiltshire Creative Production, Agatha Christie’s English play, ‘The Mirror Crack’d’ is the first ever English language adaptation of the Christie novel, The Mirror Crack’d from Side to Side, which premièred in February 2019.

Featuring Shernaz Patel, Zervaan Bunshah, Zinnia Ranji, Meher Acharia-Dar, Suhaas Ahuja, Avantika Akerkar, Sonali Kulkarni, Bhavna Pani, Gillian Pinto, Harssh Pal Singh and Denzil Smith, and directed for the Indian audience by Ayeesha Menon, the play revolves around a house-bound Miss Mistry (Shernaz Patel) is visited by her friend and rival in crime, Senior Inspector Daniel D’Mello (Denzil Smith), following a glamorous drinks party that ends in murder. Set in 1976, the mystery revolves around a fading Bollywood film star, Mamta Ghosh (Sonali Kulkarni), making her comeback in films. Why did she disappear from the silver screen; why has she moved to the old Portuguese manor house, Briganza Mansion, in a sleepy, Goan town; and who would want to kill her? This traditional whodunnit has been re-imagined to focus on the ‘why’ as much as the ‘who’. Replaying and re-examining events from a variety of perspectives, the production explores how we try to shape our memories but end up being shaped by them.

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Photo Credit: Joseph Alford.