27 July,2025 07:45 AM IST | Mumbai | Tanisha Banerjee
A performance playing at Harkat Studios. Pic/Instagram@harkat.studio
At a dimly lit black box theatre in Andheri, Kshitij sits on stage with nothing but a gut-punch of a story. No elaborate set. No background score. His voice, his body, his presence, leave the audience in stunned silence. This is not a scene from a grand theatre, but from the kind of raw, soul-baring performance that's slowly becoming the heartbeat of a post-COVID theatre revival. Though alternative theatre has existed for centuries, across intimate venues like Harkat Studios, Veda Black Box, and pop-up rooms tucked between coffee shops and garages, it is now being reclaimed while being stripped-down, self-funded, and emotionally loaded.
A recent Instagram reel by filmmaker Aditya Kripalani captured this quiet revolution, spotlighting how a post-pandemic wave of solo acts and two-person plays are redefining performance culture in Mumbai. "Theatre isn't shrinking," Kripalani says. "It's reshaping itself. It's adapting to survive."
"The OTT boom ended. Big producers stopped calling. Suddenly, no one wanted to fund a show that didn't already have a star," says Kripalani. After years in film, he found himself pulled toward the immediacy of intimate theatre. "There's no gatekeeper between you and your audience. If the work is honest, it lands." In Versova and Aram Nagar, often dubbed "Mumbai's off-Broadway", actors, writers, and directors are creating outside the commercial loop. With platforms for indie films drying up post-pandemic, and traditional stages like NCPA or even Prithvi often out of reach for newcomers, artistes began turning to black box and pop-up spaces not out of compromise, but necessity. Theatres like Harkat became havens where work could still breathe unfiltered, and unfunded.
"The ratio of actors to opportunities is wildly disproportionate," says Sharodiya Chowdhury, a theatre artiste who also runs Golpo Productions. "But these small venues let us stay in the work. To keep showing up, keep learning, keep telling stories that feel urgent." There's a palpable shift in energy. Artistes are done waiting for permission. If a stage doesn't exist, they build one. If a story doesn't fit the mould, they reshape the mould.
When storyteller Kshitij focused on his famous one-man storytelling act which he also wrote, Bachhon ki Kahani Sirf Badon ke Liye, he simply wanted to perform his art without emptying his wallet. "I treated the performance like a play but never called it one. I thought if I played all the characters then I'll save money, and my storytelling skills will also develop," he laughs. What looks like minimalism born from budget cuts is actually a deliberate act of rebellion and a move towards storytelling that is fervent, real, and independent of spectacle.
The answer lay not in cutting corners but cutting through the clutter. What he found in the process was clarity. "The audience responded to the rawness. The lack of polish made it feel more real." It's a sentiment shared across the scene. Kripalani, who often writes and stages one or two-person plays, says it's not just about affordability. "Small-cast plays are easier to rehearse and travel with. But more than that, they become conversations instead of performances. The boundary between actor and audience fades."
In Paperwalls, a one-woman show written and performed by Sharodiya, the set was made of literal cardboard boxes, which was a design choice that mirrored the fragility at the heart of the play. "The financial limitation turned into a narrative metaphor," she explains. "That set couldn't have been built by a sponsor. It had to be felt."
These black box spaces aren't a downgrade; they're a different kind of theatre altogether.
"Black box economics allow me to pay my team," says Manjiri Pupala, whose solo show Manjiri Matching Centre was written and developed for over two years. The simplicity allows for experimentation with space, narrative, and form. "You're not stuck waiting for one slot a year at a legacy venue," she adds. "You can come back next month if your story connects with your audience." She's performed in galleries, studios, even bars. The minimalism opens doors, not closes them.
For Paperwalls, the proximity was critical. "The play wouldn't survive a proscenium," Sharodiya says. "It needed to feel like the audience was boxed in with the character." These stages don't mimic cinema. They sculpt something else entirely. Moreover, audiences are responding. "People come up after the show and say that they could relate to the play so deeply," Manjiri says. "If we are bringing new audiences to these black boxes, then that's what makes it worth it." These aren't makeshift or lesser stages, instead they are purpose-built ecosystems for risk-taking and artistic agility. They also offer what mainstream venues often can't: accessibility.
And for many artistes too, these stages are their first sustained chance to work without compromise. "The way people have come and met me, talking to me emotionally, I could see it in their eyes that something has moved in them," Kshitij reflects. "I was very overwhelmed and grateful that the art circle here is always open to supporting something new."
Manjiri Matching Centre explores identity, gender, and self-worth with quiet vulnerability. "It started as a murmur," Manjiri says. "And theatre gave it space to grow without needing to be âviral'." The piece could never survive in a system chasing loglines and algorithms. "OTT still plays by mainstream rules. Originality becomes the first casualty. These theatre spaces are encouraging young original voices and their narratives to be heard." Theatre, in contrast, allows for mess, for complexity  - for the kind of tension that can't be resolved in a 30-second trailer. "In a black box, you can hear your own heartbeat," she says. "That's how I know the work is real."
Sharodiya agrees. Paperwalls grapples with intergenerational trauma - stories not meant to be stylised. "I had to look people in the eye when I told this story. There's no filter. It's terrifying. But that's what makes it theatre."
The realities, however, remain sobering. "Theatre in India isn't sustainable," says Manjiri. "Unlike the West, you can't make a living off it. But we still do it! In between other gigs, with our own money, because we need to." Artistes book their own shows, run lights, handle ticketing, and market themselves, often with nothing more than a poster and an Instagram handle. "It's very âplatform banaa lo' energy," Kshitij laughs. "If no one gives you a stage, make one."
Support, when it comes, comes from the community. Black box theatres often help promote these shows on social media, with tech rehearsals, and with lower rates. "It's built on emotion," Kripalani says of the scene. "People genuinely care for each other's work."
Even then, it's not enough. "We need more affordable rentals," says Sharodiya. "We need grants that aren't only accessible to English-speaking, well-networked artistes. Otherwise, this movement risks becoming a bubble."
Still, something irreversible has shifted. Experimental theatre is no longer a niche curiosity. It's now a legitimate cultural movement, especially among younger audiences craving truth over polish. And spaces like Harkat, Veda, Chaubara and Rangsheela have become incubators for that honesty. But the wave needs to widen. "Right now, it's Versova-specific," Sharodiya notes. "But I'd love to see this kind of work in Byculla, Dadar, Thane - anywhere people want to feel something real."
Kripalani agrees. "This ecosystem didn't come from sponsors or big banners but from the broke and the brave, from artistes who refused to stop." His voice grows sharper as he speaks. "Art doesn't die because it's broke. It gets louder. Sharper. Hungrier." And in these tight, stripped-down rooms, something is alive, pulsing through cardboard sets and silent crowds, reminding everyone that as long as there's a story to tell, theatre will find its stage.
"The whole idea of âalternative' or âintimate' theatre isn't new because it's been around for hundreds of years," says Karan Talwar, co-founder of Harkat Studios. "We're simply grateful to be part of that lineage." While post-COVID theatre didn't see a direct boom, Talwar notes a surge in the last two years, coinciding with the collapse of adjacent creative industries. "It's a kind of artistic reclamation. People are tired of making art for a corporate audience. Now, they write and perform for themselves and for whoever is willing to listen."
Harkat's black box is designed for close-knit, immersive performances. "There's no stage here since you sit with the clients," says Talwar.
"Before 2019, there were very limited spaces, so people couldn't really put up their shows," says Sampat Rathore, founder of Veda Factory. "Now, there are a lot of spaces that have cropped up, especially in Versova that takes off the stress of space for the artists." Since 2019, Veda Factory has offered affordable, low-barrier platforms for artists and groups. "Our process is pretty simple. It has been an elevator for artists to bring their ideas and performances to life."
Stories that are intimate, relatable and emotion evoking resonate best in Veda's black box where audience emotions and reactions are centric to an artist. The vision was always to foster community. "Our space thrives daily with ideas brewing," says Rathore. Support extends to low rentals and co-working access. "There is no dearth of ideas but there was a dearth of spaces," he reflects. "We've managed to bridge that gap."
