Auditions for TAJ MAHAL KA TENDER

Bay Area Drama Company invites you to audition for its upcoming production

Taj Mahal Ka Tender

(separate shows in Hindi and English)

Written by Ajay Shukla
Directed by Basab Pradhan
May 26 – June 4, 2023
Sunnyvale Theater

Auditions: Feb 18 & 19

Tech: May  23-25
Shows: May 26 to Jun 4

About the play

Emperor Shah Jahan, transplanted to modern day India, decides to build a monument in memory of his beloved wife, Mumtaz Mahal. Enter Gupta Madam, the chief engineer of CPWD Agra. She is an experienced government official, highly skilled at running large projects for the benefit of the people who really matter - herself and her associates. Project delays, red tape, budget revisions… and many years later, finally the tender for constructing the Taj Mahal is floated. But perhaps it is too late.

Taj Mahal Ka Tender is one of the great satirical comedies of Hindi theater. There will be separate shows in Hindi and English.

Auditions

In-person auditions will be held on Feb 18 & 19, at our rehearsal studio at 1585 N. 4th Street, Unit I, San Jose 95112. If you are interested in auditioning but are not available on these dates, please indicate this in the Audition Form. We may be able to audition you separately, but would greatly prefer that you came to the main auditions.

Monologue auditions will be held in the morning afternoon of Feb 18. Each auditionee will be given an individual slot for their monologue audition.  The monologue should preferably be comic and in Hindi (or English if you’d like to be considered only for the English cast), Auditionees who are successful in this stage of the audition will be invited to Callbacks, on Feb 19 at 9:30am 2pm.  At Callbacks, auditionees will read from the play’s script along with other auditionees.

Actors who have been in the cast of a recent BADCo production may come straight to Callbacks but they must still fill out the Audition Form.

Please fill out and submit your audition form to receive further instructions about the audition process.

Audition submissions are now closed.

If you would like to be a part of the crew for this play, as part of the backstage or design teams, please write to us at info@bayareadrama.company

Roles Available

All roles are for actors who can play South Asian characters.

The same cast will perform in Hindi and English. In other words, every actor will perform in both the English shows and the Hindi shows. You must be fluent in both languages. [Update: We may have actors in both casts, or in just one of the casts. So not being fluent in one language should not deter you from auditioning.] Also, like modern India, both Hindi and English may be spoken with regional accents, for most roles.

Here are the roles available:

  • Gupta Madam - Precast

  • Shah Jahan - the Mughal emperor in modern times. Can play M 30-60

  • Sudhir - cunning assistant to a corrupt government officer, Gupta Madam. Can play M/F 20-40

  • Bhaiyyaji - wily Contractor associated with Gupta Madam’s projects. Can play M/F 40-60

  • Ensemble - 6 actors.  No gender or age restrictions.

  1. Actor 1 - Courtier 1, Dancer 1, News Anchor 1.

  2. Actor 2 - Courtier 2, Dancer 2, News Anchor 2, Peon.

  3. Actor 3 - Neta 1, Courtier 3, Dancer 3

  4. Actor 4 - Sharma, Courtier 4, Villager 1

  5. Actor 5 - Sethi, Courtier 5, Villager 2

  6. Actor 6 - Neta 2, Chopra, Courtier 6, Villager 3

Ensemble actors will play multiple characters and each actor will have plenty of lines. 

Rehearsals

All rehearsals will be held in-person at our rehearsal studio in San Jose. We typically rehearse two days a week on weekday evenings and both weekend days.

Rehearsals will begin on March 19. To be considered for the cast of this play you must have very good availability from March 19 onwards and you must be available from May 13 to Jun 4, when run throughs, tech rehearsals and performances are scheduled.

All performances will be held at Sunnyvale Theater.

The health and safety of our cast and crew are very important to us. You must be fully vaccinated for COVID, as per the CDC guidelines, in order to audition.

We are a non-union company. All roles are unpaid, volunteer positions.

For more information please reach out to us at info@bayareadrama.company

Basab Pradhan