‘ Dancing on the Moon,’ a Highly Entertaining Drama
San Diego, CA: Dance, humor and a touching love story came together brilliantly on stage when theater company, Hamid Daudani & Group, teamed up with dance troupe, Bollywood Tranz, to present “Dancing on the Moon” at the Poway Center for the Performing Arts on April 10.
An audience of more than 700 people watched the musical extravaganza. This was the highest attendance in the history of the Group. There is no other local production in San Diego which could boast of such attendance. The Group has been in existence since the last 20 years and has presented 17 plays during this period. Patrons come not only from San Diego but places like Yuma Arizona, El Centro, Orange County, Mission Viejo, LA county and many visiting San Diego from India.
Dancing on the Moon told the tale of a renowned director named Aamir auditioning a group of dancers for his next grand performance. More than two dozen dancers performed several expertly choreographed numbers, ranging in style from Western to Classic to Folk, etc., as the story of the auditions unfolded.
Ankush Prakash convincingly played the role of Aamir, who interviewed each of the candidates, wanting to learn about their personal side, and allowing them to reveal their colorful and often hilarious pasts. A number of candidates auditioning for the job gave a wonderful performance in acting as well as in dancing.
Aamir’s assistant Millie, realistically depicted by Shruti Brawsar, kept the action moving until the surprising arrival of Aamir’s old flame, Aashi. Lekha Motiwala brought both charm and beauty to the role with her passionate dialogue and skillful dance moves.
The drama reached its fantastic conclusion with the descent of a space shuttle on a moonscape, where the chosen dancers performed a spectacular series of dances in the play within a play. Aashi manages to find her way into the production, Aamir finds compassion and the audience finds themselves carried away by this heavenly performance.
Hamid Daudani, the writer, producer and director, was jubilant as he was being showered with accolades at the end of the show. “I am lucky to have found the cast which can act as well as dance,” he said. “They all did a spectacular job by putting thousands of hours rehearsing and polishing the act.”
Dance choreography was very well handled by six different artists. Kalpesh Rathod who acted as a candidate for the job also managed dance production and other details along with Meghna Mehta, Lekha Motiwala and Ajay Tayade. Nipul Shah, the veteran technical director, designed sets and a space shuttle which descended from the sky.
Costumes were amazing and were designed to suit the earthly and moon environment. Sunny Thota was the event coordinator and also managed sound with Samir Kagalwala. Suman Tatiraju expertly managed the lighting.
