What She Said

Playwright, theatre director, founder member and artistic director of JustUs Repertory, Dr Gowri Ramnarayan was formerly Deputy Editor, The Hindu, and vocal accompanist to legendary musician MS Subbulakshmi. Her multilingual and multi-genre theatre productions have been staged in major cities in India, South Asia, north America and Great Britain. She has authored biographies and children’s books, translated Vijay Tendulkar’s Marathi plays and Kalki Krishnamurti’s Tamil fiction, served as Fipresci Jury member at international film festivals in Europe. She is Chairperson, Rukmini Devi Arundale Trust; Senior Associate, Sruti magazine; Member, Regional Advisory Committee, ICCR; and Adjunct Faculty, Asian College of Journalism.

Actor, writer and director with over 13 years experience in Chennai’s English theatre, Sunandha Raghunathan has worked on a variety of plays with leading theatre companies. She wrote the play Mundhirikkotte (developed at The Royal Court’s International Writing Programme), as also several award winning one-act plays in the Short + Sweet Festival, and the screenplay for the critically acclaimed Irudhi Suttru. A Charles Wallace scholar with a Master’s Degree in Text and Performance (RADA & Birkbeck College), she was a member of the 2019 Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab. Sunandha is also trained in Bharatanatyam and Kalaripayattu.

Writer, literary scholar, theatre actor, and indie musician, Dr Akhila Ramnarayan has served as literature faculty and academic administrator in higher education institutions in India and the United States and is currently at Krea University. A 2013-14 recipient of the Sangeet Natak Akademi’s Ustad Bismillah Khan Yuva Puraskar, she has performed and toured across the country and internationally since 2007 with JustUs Repertory. She is a vocalist and songwriter, one half of the indie rock duo Starcracker, releasing two full-length records and 2 EPs to date with multi-instrumentalist Doug Carraway.

A Bharatanatyam and contemporary dance practitioner with an MA Res in Contemporary Performance Studies from the University of Hull, Aarabi Veeraraghavan is deeply influenced by the spoken and written word in her choreography and practice, something which has led her to theatre. She has been a part of Gowri Ramnarayan’s productions as actor and as member of  JustUs Repertory’s technical/production teams since 2007. Aarabi teaches Pilates and dance techniques, focusing on injury prevention and alignment techniques.

Srividya Vadlamani is a Carnatic vocalist and vina player who has learnt under several renowned gurus including Neyveli R. Santhanagopalan and Sujana Parupalli. A graded All India Radio artist who has won awards, she seeks to blend her creative and analytical skills as a musician and a commerce graduate with an interest in business management, financial analysis, and entrepreneurship.

B Charles is a META-nominated Lighting Designer with over a decade of experience, 15 years, in the industry of performing arts – classical dance, music, concerts, theater and stand up specials within India and abroad. Apart from being a lighting designer, he has also written and directed plays. He is the founder of Chennai Art Theatre & MEDAI The Stage in Chennai and Bangalore.