Doyen of directing

Sam Kerawalla received yet another Lifetime Achievement Award from the Events and Entertainment Management Association, Jaipur on September 7, 2013. Earlier, the noted theater director had been presented with several similar awards including Kingfisher Fashion — Hall of Fame, Thespo Lifetime Achievement Award, The D. D. Mehta Memorial Trust’s Lifetime Achievement Award and another from Zoroastrian College. Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan too has recognized his contribution to the field of theater, reveals a write-up received by Parsiana via email from Farah Ghadiali, manager, events marketing of the National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA) in Bombay.

Sam Kerawalla: veteran of Parsi theater

The veteran considers the late Adi Marzban as his "true guru,” Ghadiali writes. Kerawalla worked under Marzban in Parsi theater as stage manager for a number of years, making his own directorial debut with Run For Your Wife in the 1970s, a long running play which logged over 1,000 shows. Having designed and directed nearly 300 plays and musicals during his long career, among Kerawalla’s recent offerings are Butterflies Are Free, based on the eponymous Broadway hit and The Game based on The Gin Game, a Pulitzer Prize winning play. As a tribute to his mentor the theater doyen has been directing Marzban’s plays at the NCPA, under the aegis of the Adi Marzban Endowment Fund for the past 17 years, the email mentions.