Shishir Kurup
- Actor
- Director
- Writer
Shishir Kurup, is an actor/writer/director/composer and Books-On-Tape
narrator born in Bombay, India raised in Mombasa, Kenya and the U.S.
His one-man shows "Assimilation" and "Exile: Ruminations on a Reluctant
Martyr" (the latter a commission from Highways Performance Space) have
been seen in countless cities and universities nationally and
internationally including Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Austin,
London and Manchester, England. His essay "In-Between-Space" appears in
"Let's Get It On: The Politics of Black Performance," published by the
Institute of Contemporary Arts in London. Assimilation is published by
Rutgers Press in the anthology "Bold Words: A Century of Asian American
Writing." He was profiled in author Mei Ling Cheng's book: "In Other
Los Angeleses-Multicentric Performance Art." His solo performance piece
"Sharif Don't Like It" examines the fallout from the USA Patriot Act
and the disappearance of over two thousand South Asian and Arab Muslims
and played in October '09 at the National Asian American Theatre
Festival in NYC. He received his BFA in Acting/Directing from the
University of Florida and his MFA in acting from the conservatory at
U.C. San Diego.
Shishir is a long-time ensemble member of the nationally renowned
Cornerstone Theater Company and was nominated for an Ovation Award for
acting in Cornerstone's, "Malliere." He has also written over a hundred
and fifty songs for Cornerstone, winning Garland and Dramalogue Awards
for music composition in "Los Vecinos" and "Candude" (the latter
directed by him and nominated for an Ovation Award for Best Musical of
the Year); and for Acting in "Twelfth Night," "MedeaMacbethCinderella
(MMC)"and "Los Biombos," directed by Bill Rauch, Tracy Young and Peter
Sellars, respectively. He was composer for Cornerstone's adaptation of
"The Good Person of New Haven" at the Long Wharf Theater and for a
subsequent MMC production at the Yale Rep. MMC recently opened at the
Oregon Shakespeare Festival and ran through November 2012.
In 2006 he composed songs for Cornerstone's production of "As You Like
It: A California Concoction" at the Pasadena Playhouse and Co-composed
songs for and directed Cornerstone's twentieth anniversary show,
"Demeter in the City," at Redcat in Disney Hall written by Macarthur
Fellow Sarah Ruhl. His play "On Caring for the Beast" opened in New
York in April 2001 at the Currican Theater and was the inaugural
production for both Disha Theatre Company and Inner City Arts'
Rosenthal Theater in February 2010 respectively, the latter as an
ensemble show for Cornerstone Theater Company. Shishir was one of only
six people Nationally to receive the TIME (Time for Inspiration,
Motivation and Exploration) Grant from the Audrey Skirball Foundation
in recognition of his body of work. In 2006 and 2010 he was a Herb
Alpert Award nominee for theater. Also in 2010 he was one of three
finalists for the prestigious Alan Schneider award in directing from
Theatre Communications Group. Shishir closed a very successful sold out
run in the fall of 2010 of Making Paradise: The West Hollywood Musical
for which he was the lyricist. In the spring of 2011 he directed Lynn
Mannning's, The Unrequited: Between Two Worlds.
For Cornerstone, he has also written and directed "Ghurba" with the
Arab-American community in the Los Angeles Festival and written,
directed and composed "An Antigone Story," a multi-media, Rock'n'Roll
hijack of Sophocles' classic at The Getty Center and The Subway
Terminal Building. He also co-directed (with Bill Rauch) and composed
songs for "Everyman in the Mall", and was playwright and composer for
"Sid Arthur" and "Birthday of the Century." "As Vishnu Dreams,"
Shishir's meditation on the Ramayana, completed a highly successful run
in 2004 at East West Players with critic's choice from both the LA
Times and LA Weekly. In June 2007 he directed the sold out run of "Los
Illegals," by Michael John Garces, which kicked off Cornerstone's three
year Justice Cycle. Shishir is nearing completion of his first feature
film with Cornerstone of "Sharif Don't Like It," and will be looking
for distribution around the country and abroad.
Elsewhere, he directed Sung Rno's, "Cleveland Raining" at East West
Players and "Ten Angry Clowns" at the Delle Arte School as well as
several productions at the Los Angeles Theater Center where he was a
part of the Artistic Staff running the Asian American Theatre Project.
Shishir is a Princess Grace fellow. He is a California Arts Council
Grant and Kennedy Center, Roger. L. Stevens Award recipient for his
modern verse appropriation, "Merchant on Venice," set in the South
Asian community in and around Venice Boulevard in Culver City. Merchant
was picked for the first annual South-Asian Diaspora festival at New
York's Lark Theatre. It also received an NEA/TCG Extended Collaboration
Grant for further development workshops in Los Angeles and New York at
East West Players and The Lark respectively. Merchant performed at the
Mark Taper Forum's New Plays for Now Festival at the Kirk Douglas
Theater in the Spring of '05. In the Fall of '07 Merchant premiered at
The Silk Road Theatre Project in Chicago to unanimously stellar reviews
and the Ten Best List of the Chicago Tribune, Sun-Times and Time Out
Magazine as well as other publications. The play will travel to England
for its London premiere produced by Rented Space Theatre. Merchant was
recently published in the anthology Beyond Bollywood and Broadway:
Plays from the South Asian Diaspora from Indiana Press. He recently
received a MAP grant along with writer Sigrid Gilmer for Cornerstone's
fall '12 production of SEED: A weird Act of Faith for which he
directed. Upcoming directing projects include: the Mellon commissioned
play by James Mcmanus, Love on San Pedro, for Cornerstone Theater
Company in L.A.'s Skid Row and the Pulitzer Prize winning play Water by
the Spoonful by Quiara Allegria Hudes for the Oregon Shakespeare
Festival. In the Spring of 2014 his own Mellon commission, Bliss Point,
will be produced by Cornerstone Theater Company and directed by
Juliette Carrillo.
Shishir's many theatre roles have included Macbeth, Feste, Azdak, and
Trigorin. He played 'The Director' in Alison Carey's "For Here or to
Go?" at the Mark Taper Forum. His many film and television credits
include: Coneheads, Trigger Effect, City of Angels (film and TV
series), In Good Company, Sleeper Cell, Bones, Cold Case, Numb3rs,
Lost, Alias, Monk, Charmed, NYPD Blue, The Agency, Murder in Small Town
X, Strong Medicine, Judging Amy, Off Centre, Six Feet Under, ER, C-16,
etc... recurring roles on: Heroes, Surface, M.D.'s, Chicago Hope, and
West Wing; series regulars in the Pilots: Veronica's Video, Laugh
Damnit! w/the late Greg Giraldo and The Ripples; Independent films: The
Zeroes, Turbans, The Want, The Prime Gig, A Day Without A Mexican and
Miss Nobody. Most recently he was seen in the ABC/Disney film Lemonade
Mouth and for Lifetime Television's Five More directed by Bryce Dallas
Howard. He is the proud father of the lovely Tala Claye Ananya Perl
Kurup who continues to be the most instructive presence in his life.
narrator born in Bombay, India raised in Mombasa, Kenya and the U.S.
His one-man shows "Assimilation" and "Exile: Ruminations on a Reluctant
Martyr" (the latter a commission from Highways Performance Space) have
been seen in countless cities and universities nationally and
internationally including Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Austin,
London and Manchester, England. His essay "In-Between-Space" appears in
"Let's Get It On: The Politics of Black Performance," published by the
Institute of Contemporary Arts in London. Assimilation is published by
Rutgers Press in the anthology "Bold Words: A Century of Asian American
Writing." He was profiled in author Mei Ling Cheng's book: "In Other
Los Angeleses-Multicentric Performance Art." His solo performance piece
"Sharif Don't Like It" examines the fallout from the USA Patriot Act
and the disappearance of over two thousand South Asian and Arab Muslims
and played in October '09 at the National Asian American Theatre
Festival in NYC. He received his BFA in Acting/Directing from the
University of Florida and his MFA in acting from the conservatory at
U.C. San Diego.
Shishir is a long-time ensemble member of the nationally renowned
Cornerstone Theater Company and was nominated for an Ovation Award for
acting in Cornerstone's, "Malliere." He has also written over a hundred
and fifty songs for Cornerstone, winning Garland and Dramalogue Awards
for music composition in "Los Vecinos" and "Candude" (the latter
directed by him and nominated for an Ovation Award for Best Musical of
the Year); and for Acting in "Twelfth Night," "MedeaMacbethCinderella
(MMC)"and "Los Biombos," directed by Bill Rauch, Tracy Young and Peter
Sellars, respectively. He was composer for Cornerstone's adaptation of
"The Good Person of New Haven" at the Long Wharf Theater and for a
subsequent MMC production at the Yale Rep. MMC recently opened at the
Oregon Shakespeare Festival and ran through November 2012.
In 2006 he composed songs for Cornerstone's production of "As You Like
It: A California Concoction" at the Pasadena Playhouse and Co-composed
songs for and directed Cornerstone's twentieth anniversary show,
"Demeter in the City," at Redcat in Disney Hall written by Macarthur
Fellow Sarah Ruhl. His play "On Caring for the Beast" opened in New
York in April 2001 at the Currican Theater and was the inaugural
production for both Disha Theatre Company and Inner City Arts'
Rosenthal Theater in February 2010 respectively, the latter as an
ensemble show for Cornerstone Theater Company. Shishir was one of only
six people Nationally to receive the TIME (Time for Inspiration,
Motivation and Exploration) Grant from the Audrey Skirball Foundation
in recognition of his body of work. In 2006 and 2010 he was a Herb
Alpert Award nominee for theater. Also in 2010 he was one of three
finalists for the prestigious Alan Schneider award in directing from
Theatre Communications Group. Shishir closed a very successful sold out
run in the fall of 2010 of Making Paradise: The West Hollywood Musical
for which he was the lyricist. In the spring of 2011 he directed Lynn
Mannning's, The Unrequited: Between Two Worlds.
For Cornerstone, he has also written and directed "Ghurba" with the
Arab-American community in the Los Angeles Festival and written,
directed and composed "An Antigone Story," a multi-media, Rock'n'Roll
hijack of Sophocles' classic at The Getty Center and The Subway
Terminal Building. He also co-directed (with Bill Rauch) and composed
songs for "Everyman in the Mall", and was playwright and composer for
"Sid Arthur" and "Birthday of the Century." "As Vishnu Dreams,"
Shishir's meditation on the Ramayana, completed a highly successful run
in 2004 at East West Players with critic's choice from both the LA
Times and LA Weekly. In June 2007 he directed the sold out run of "Los
Illegals," by Michael John Garces, which kicked off Cornerstone's three
year Justice Cycle. Shishir is nearing completion of his first feature
film with Cornerstone of "Sharif Don't Like It," and will be looking
for distribution around the country and abroad.
Elsewhere, he directed Sung Rno's, "Cleveland Raining" at East West
Players and "Ten Angry Clowns" at the Delle Arte School as well as
several productions at the Los Angeles Theater Center where he was a
part of the Artistic Staff running the Asian American Theatre Project.
Shishir is a Princess Grace fellow. He is a California Arts Council
Grant and Kennedy Center, Roger. L. Stevens Award recipient for his
modern verse appropriation, "Merchant on Venice," set in the South
Asian community in and around Venice Boulevard in Culver City. Merchant
was picked for the first annual South-Asian Diaspora festival at New
York's Lark Theatre. It also received an NEA/TCG Extended Collaboration
Grant for further development workshops in Los Angeles and New York at
East West Players and The Lark respectively. Merchant performed at the
Mark Taper Forum's New Plays for Now Festival at the Kirk Douglas
Theater in the Spring of '05. In the Fall of '07 Merchant premiered at
The Silk Road Theatre Project in Chicago to unanimously stellar reviews
and the Ten Best List of the Chicago Tribune, Sun-Times and Time Out
Magazine as well as other publications. The play will travel to England
for its London premiere produced by Rented Space Theatre. Merchant was
recently published in the anthology Beyond Bollywood and Broadway:
Plays from the South Asian Diaspora from Indiana Press. He recently
received a MAP grant along with writer Sigrid Gilmer for Cornerstone's
fall '12 production of SEED: A weird Act of Faith for which he
directed. Upcoming directing projects include: the Mellon commissioned
play by James Mcmanus, Love on San Pedro, for Cornerstone Theater
Company in L.A.'s Skid Row and the Pulitzer Prize winning play Water by
the Spoonful by Quiara Allegria Hudes for the Oregon Shakespeare
Festival. In the Spring of 2014 his own Mellon commission, Bliss Point,
will be produced by Cornerstone Theater Company and directed by
Juliette Carrillo.
Shishir's many theatre roles have included Macbeth, Feste, Azdak, and
Trigorin. He played 'The Director' in Alison Carey's "For Here or to
Go?" at the Mark Taper Forum. His many film and television credits
include: Coneheads, Trigger Effect, City of Angels (film and TV
series), In Good Company, Sleeper Cell, Bones, Cold Case, Numb3rs,
Lost, Alias, Monk, Charmed, NYPD Blue, The Agency, Murder in Small Town
X, Strong Medicine, Judging Amy, Off Centre, Six Feet Under, ER, C-16,
etc... recurring roles on: Heroes, Surface, M.D.'s, Chicago Hope, and
West Wing; series regulars in the Pilots: Veronica's Video, Laugh
Damnit! w/the late Greg Giraldo and The Ripples; Independent films: The
Zeroes, Turbans, The Want, The Prime Gig, A Day Without A Mexican and
Miss Nobody. Most recently he was seen in the ABC/Disney film Lemonade
Mouth and for Lifetime Television's Five More directed by Bryce Dallas
Howard. He is the proud father of the lovely Tala Claye Ananya Perl
Kurup who continues to be the most instructive presence in his life.