Krishnendu Adhikari is an Indian actor, director and producer who primarily works in Bengali theatre and the Bengali Film Industry. He co-founded the Kolkata-based performance collective Behala Project Prometheus in 2016. He is dedicated towards revitalizing political and movement-based theatre in India.
Biography
Born in Tamluk, West Bengal, Adhikari is the youngest of three siblings. He completed his Bachelors in English literature from Midnapore College, West Bengal. In 2012, Adhikari began his creative journey as ensemble actor and professional photographer with the Rang Roop theatre group in Kolkata, India. Over the course of the next five years, he received intensive training in physical/vocal acting, body awareness and kinesthetics under the tutelage of Indian performance stalwarts Sima Mukhopadhyay and Vikram Iyengar. Adhikari also learned the Tamil martial artKalaripayattu under the able guidance of Indian facilitator Arka Mukhopadhyay. In 2016, Adhikari participated in the prestigious Bharat Rang Mahotsavtheatre festival in Delhi, India, as actor and production manager in Rajar Mrityu and Raajrokto. In the same year, Adhikari had his breakthrough moment as a theatre actor with two concurrent and widely appreciated Bengali productions - Ags'uddhi and Indur O Manush. Adhikari's portrayal of Chhotu Mandi, the lead character in Ags'uddhi, received particular critical acclaim. Later, in 2018, Adhikari headlined a theatrical production titled Mrityusangbad. Having earned significant praise for his portrayal of the "Stranger", Adhikari and team travelled to Mysore, India with Mrityusangbad as part of the 20th Bharat Rang Mahotsav festival in 2019. In 2016, Adhikari co-founded his own performance company - Behala Project Prometheus - with professional associate Indudipa Sinha, with an aim to rejuvenate and redefine creative expression in political and movement-based theatre in India. It was early 2017 when Adhikari and the company premiered their magnum opus Code Red - a theatre and dance presentation, adapted from Rabindranath Tagore's poem Sishutirtha, and directed by Sinha. Adhikari served as ensemble member, production manager, and assistant director to this critically hailed production, which travelled nationally as part of the 8th Theatre Olympics in Bhopal, India and the fifth C.G.K. Rashtriya Rangothsava in Bengaluru, India. Adhikari had his directorial debut at the Short and Sweet theatre festival in Kolkata in 2015 with a ten-minute play titled One Two Three. In 2016, Adhikari had his maiden silver screen venture as an actor in the critically acclaimed Bengali filmTope - The Bait, directed by Buddhadeb Dasgupta, which travelled to the Toronto International Film Festival, the 60th BFI London Film Festival, and the 21st Busan International Film Festival. In 2017, Adhikari had his debut in the commercial Bengali Film Industry as a supporting character in Birsa Dasgupta's One. Adhikari has also featured in independent Bengali short films, notable among which are Niruddesh/Adrift and Banshi. In 2018, Niruddesh/Adrift, with Adikari in the lead, was selected and screened as part of the Hyderabad Bengali Film Festival in Hyderabad, India, the India Shorts Competition organised by the 9th Jagran Film Festival in Delhi, India, and an international screening organised by The Tannenbusch House in Bonn, Germany. In 2019, Niruddesh/Adrift was selected to be screened as part of the Second South Asian Short Film Festival in Kolkata, India. Adhikari, along with Behala Project Prometheus, premiered a Bengali theatre production in 2018 titled Jara Jege Thake, with allegorical references to the present political climate in West Bengal and India. In 2019, Adhikari starred in the first installment of a Bengali web series titled The Senapatis as sub-inspector G. R. Neogi on the Indian web entertainment platform .
