Artists and Comedians
Anuvab Pal
Mumbai
Anuvab Pal is an Indian stand up comedian, screenwriter, playwright and novelist. Pal co-wrote the 2007 cult hit Indian comedy, Loins Of Punjab Presents, with Manish Acharya which The New York Times called ´a witty musical comedy´.
His play, The President Is Coming, was made into a Bollywood film The President Is Coming by Bollywood producer Rohan Sippy, directed by actor Kunaal Roy Kapur.
Noted critic, journalist and author Anupama Chopra reviewing it on her TV show on the Indian news channel NDTV, said the film was uncontrollably funny in most parts. It was also features on a BBC News story titled ´Bollywood´s farewell Bush handshake´.
The play The President Is Coming directed by Kunaal Roy Kapur opened at The Rage Theatre Writers Bloc Festival in 2007. The Hindu previewed it under the title “Beating Around The Bush“.
As a stand up comedian, Pal started out with The British Comedy Store when they opened in Mumbai in 2010 and has since toured across the nation with his acclaimed one man show, The Nation Wants To Know to sold out houses mostly in Mumbai but also New Delhi, Kolkata, Shillong, Bangalore, and Pune.
His first play Chaos Theory, a love story between two Indian professors, was written in New York City, and performed in various productions around the United States. The Los Angeles Times, while writing about the Artwallah Festival, a South Asian cultural festival where the play was performed in 2003, said ´Pal´s characters are professional immigrants whose questions may not be so much about economic survival as intellectual and spiritual survival.[11] The play received its first professional production in New York City in 2010 starring TV and film actor Rita Wolf, directed by Alexa Kelly and produced by The Pulse Ensemble Theatre.
The India production of the play happened in 2008 and starred TV and theatre actor Zafar Karachiwala and TV, film and theatre actor Anahita Oberoi directed by theatre director Rahul Da Cunha and produced by his Rage Productions.
In 2011, He was featured in a New York Times video, ´A Night At The Comedy Club´ and CNNgo, a travel website of CNN, mentioned him on a list of ´20 Mumbai People To Watch´.
He was also interviewed in the BBC News segment titled ´Having A Laugh In India´ and was, along with comedian and presenter Cyrus Broacha, the only Indian comedian on the popular BBC Radio 4 show Just A Minute with Nicholas Parsons. That episode also featured famous British comedians Paul Merton and Marcus Brigstocke.
He contributes columns often to magazines like Time Out Mumbai. Three of his plays, Chaos Theory, The President Is Coming and 1 888 Dial India have been published as novels. He has also written a non fiction book on the Bollywood movie, Disco Dancer.
In 2017, when Amazon Prime launched in India, Anuvab was chosen among India´s top 20 comedians to have his stand up special Alive At 40, on the Amazon Prime platform.
In 2018, his 8 episode comedy Going Viral starring Kunaal Roy Kapur was produced by Amazon Prime.
In Feb 2018, Anuvab Pal did his stand up special The Nation Wants To Know at Harvard Business School. It was part of the prestigious Harvard South Asia Conference.
