Director of �Vagina Monologues�, which won an Obie award, Mahabanoo Mody Kotwal claims her theatre is not elitist - by Purva Desai How was the experience of directing a play like � vagina monologues�, which is a women oriented play, dealing with sensitive issues? The experience was wonderful. It was unbelievable. The audience response was a major tension. But the Bombay public accepted it very openly. As a director, what are your expectations from your actors? As a director, I expect my actors to do their best and not try and do their best because people come to see you do your best. Is there any message you would like to give audiences? I don�t believe in messages. Just want the audience to keep welcoming our productions. All our productions have really been appreciated. Any one play that you would love to direct? Am currently doing that with Vagina Monologues. English theatre is usually seen as elitist theatre. Comment. I don�t think so. Vagina Monologue has lower middle class people watching the play. People are seeing it and loving it. My theatre is not elitist. Have no illusion of being elitist. My plays are appreciated by all. Your views on the current theatre scenario? Theatre is moving forward. I am helping bring theatre forward. Never underestimate audiences. Give them good stuff. Not the same thing again and again. The young bunch is doing a lot. Young women are writing plays but there is a dearth of originality. People should branch out. I rarely adapt. Our scriptwriters need to hone their creative skills. Too much of soap opera language is used in plays. We don�t like that. 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Interview 2 Timira Gupta Jyoti Dogra Lillette Dubey Mahesh Dattani Chandan Roy Sanyal Sunil Shanbag (ii) Jairaj Patil Jehan Manekshaw K Raja Ravi Verma Sankar Venkateswaran Heisnam Tomba Hariharan Jamini Pathak Hilda David Satish Alekar Vir Das Ranjit Hoskote Om Katare Nipun Dharmadhikari Satyadev Dubey Dipan Ray Stefan Kaegi Zafar Karachiwala Dakxin Bajrange Makarand Sathe Ramu Ramanathann Cyrus Dastur Shekhar Sen Benjamin Juhel Chaitanya Tamhane And Sudeep Modak Sujata Mehta Asif Basra Barry John Nagesh Bhosale Astad Deboo Manhar Gadhia Sandesh Bhandare Usha Ganguli Sushama Deshpande & Suhas Joshi Jyoti Vyas Arundhati Nag Habib Tanvir Ramu Ramanathan Pushan Kripalani Harold Pinter Rajeev Ravindranathan Rajendra Gupta Viji Iyengar Sunil Shanbag Darshan Jariwalla Smriti Irani Atul Kumar1 Ashwin Gidwani Toral Shah Mahabanoo Mody Kotwal1 Shaili Sathyu Sanjay Narvekar Rohini Hattangady Dr. Ashok Ranade Vandana Sajnani Mahesh Elkunchwar Madhu Rye Mahesh Thakur Srimathi Madiman Kinnari Vohra Joy Fernandes C.K. 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