Ankita Raturi | अंकिता रतूड़ी

Being very vulnerable here posting this on main, but I’ve decided it’s time. In the theatre world, I’m a writer and I stay behind the scenes. There is no such hiding in Kathak. Here goes. Almost three years ago, I dedicated myself to the study and practice of Kathak with @maeridance On May 9th, I’m performing my first solo in Maeri Dance’s first independent production. I would love it if my community of friends, family, and colleagues came to see this show. I am still learning and my Kathak practice is definitely a work in progress, but I am excited to finally share this very important part of my artistic life more widely. It is an incredible honor to be sharing a stage with my guru and sister-in-law @alpabasu whose craft, grace, and storytelling inspire me every week. I have many more years to go in this journey, but with her support, I believe I can master this form one day. I’m also doing a goofy duet with my Kathak day one, Mansi. Two of the most incredible dancers who trained alongside Alpa are performing as well, and I can’t believe my lucky stars that I will take a bow with @pernashee_ and @gia.mitcham The next generation of this lineage, including two of my nephews, is bringing their cutest possible energy to stage. The whole show is 90s Bollywood nostalgia, the best of Bollywood in my very unbiased 90s baby opinion. You will see Kathak, Bharatanatyam, semi-classical, and modern Bollywood. All proceeds from this show support Blood Cancer United. Ticket link in @maeridance bio A limited number of sponsored seats are available so please reach out to me directly if the ticket price is a barrier and I’ll see if any of those tickets are still available! The proceeds from those tickets will support this amazing cause and you can still see some amazing dance, so don’t let the ticket price hold you back.

We are thrilled to announce that @ankitawrites is the recipient of the 2026/2027 @theblcklst x @tmtcharlem Ladder Commission. Over the next year, she will write a new play, working alongside the Producing Artistic Leadership team at The Movement, which will culminate in a workshop in 2027. She will also receive $10,000. We are so excited to work with Ankita - give her a congrats in the comments!

नेहा & Neel closes on November 16th in LA! This production has meant so much to me. To see my bilingual play come to life professionally and resonate with so many people. To see this story received with so much love and such unapologetic embrace of the diaspora experience. Opening night was a desi dream, magically coinciding with Diwali weekend for a play that really has been my source of levity and joy in the face of the ignorance that seems to surround us. Thank you to this whole team - and to every team that has worked on this play with me from first draft to world premiere - for laughing these laughs with me, for being so relentlessly us in both process and product, for making this play move at the unabating pace of life, for knowing when to slow me down, for being as funny and as sad and as scared and as stubborn as all our families. I am so proud of what we made together. I’m making a tradition of posting pictures that go back in time through a play’s development on the occasion of its world premiere. So you can scroll through these to go back from opening night and my post-show talkback at @latinotheaterco to last year’s workshop to the previous year’s UCSD Wagner production and all the way back to the first reading at UCSD in December 2022 (still my favorite use of music stands ever) Thank you so much to this नेहा & Neel team: Produced by @artistsatplayla @ms_s_l_ @mariezpz @thatjuliacho @kacawcaw @nicholaspilapil Directed by @lilytungcrystal Associate Director @katielynnebradley Production Stage Manager @I__naee Assistant Stage Manager @bonifacia.erlinda Neha (नेहा) @itspiashah Understudy @priyamohantyofficial Neel (नील) @aachu_blessu Understudy @sethguna Arnav (अर्णव) /Avatars (अवतारों) @parvey Understudy @ronakgandhi_ Set @leahramillano Props @naomistar_k Costumes @elenafloresdesign Lights @grababite Sound @eltonsounds Dramaturgy @arnabanerji Wardrobe - @dianaisonline And thank you to the OGs @ringaroundro_z @raphaelmishleratwork @bronzepillar @swarupae @_mehrkaur @nandiniminocha and so so many more people that Instagram won’t let me tag you all. Photos by @mpalmaphoto @rionnebreja @richryanphoto

We have such an incredibly fun and funny Whisper in the Wings from Stage Whisper in store for you! On this new episode we welcomed on the playwright Ankita Raturi and the actors Pia Shah, Achintya Pandey, and Parv Cheena, to talk about their incredible new show नेहा & Neel . This truly was such a great time, and some wonderful insights and idea were shared throughout our conversation. So make sure you do not miss this show. Hit play and run to get your tickets to see this fantastic work! @jaymichaelrsglobal #stagewhisperpod #whisperinthewings #asheardonstagewhisper #नेहाandNeel #losangelestheatercenter #indietheatre #fall2025 नेहा & Neel October 18th- November 16th
@ The Los Angeles Theater Center (Los Angeles, CA) Tickets and more information are available at latinotheaterco.org And be sure to follow our guests to stay up to date on all their upcoming projects and productions: @artistsatplayla @itspiashah @parvey @aachu_blessu @ankitawrites

Spotlight time! Meet Ankita(she/her), a writer and teaching artist who grew up in capital cities, pediatric gastroenterology offices, and the bisexual closet. She writes hyper-theatrical works in English, Hindi/Urdu, and sometimes Bahasa Indonesia about living between cultural identities and contending with the ongoing legacies of colonization. Her plays include नेहा & Neel, Fifty Boxes of Earth, No One Plays Badminton in America, and The Elephant is Very Like. New play development: Theater Mu, Playwrights’ Center, New York Theatre Workshop, Roundabout, Ma-Yi Theater Company, South Coast Repertory, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Playwrights Realm, Berkshire Theatre Group, Cygnet Theatre, Artists at Play, The COOP, Atlantic Pacific Theatre, Theater Masters, Fresh Ground Pepper, Hypokrit Theatre Company, New York Shakespeare Exchange, Pete’s Candy Store, Natyabharati, Wesleyan University. 2022 Ollie Award Winner and 2024 Los Angeles New Play Project Award Winner. B.F.A. in Drama: NYU/Tisch. M.F.A. in Playwriting: UC San Diego. Second-year Kathak student: Maeri Dance. We are thrilled to have Ankita (@ankitawrites ) participating in this first version of Reality Meets Fiction as a playwright and radio-actor. This Wednesday, Sep 24 at 4:00 pm we’ll be broadcasting live on LH Radio (@lhradionyc ). Join us to know more about Ankita’s work and her creative mind.

Thanks to the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature (@nyscouncilonthearts ). Thanks to the Fiscal Sponsor City Lore (@city_lore ). This year I was awareded with the Individual Artist grant and it was possible to create the project Reality Meets Fiction. 

Thanks to Los Herederos (@losherederosnyc ), for their ongoing support, for opening their doors and make their community space available for this project to take place in the heart of Jackson Heights. Thanks to the passengers who stopped their rushed commute and decided to imagine other perspectives. Special thanks to Juan Varela (@juanvarela.co ) for designing the project image and to Ania Upstill (@butchmermaid ) and Ankita Raturi (@ankitawrites ) for bringing to life the characters you’ll get to hear for the first time on Sep 24th on LH Radio (@lhradionyc ).

New Today! "Fifty Boxes of Earth" at Theater Mu was a maximalist play that combined Western and South Asian theatrical styles, choreography, and puppetry. Lianna Matt McLernon and playwright Ankita Raturi talk about the show’s collective approach and how it was created to be reproduced for any specific community. ⁠ ⁠ Click the link in bio to read the full essay 🔗⁠ ⁠ Photos by Rich Ryan

3 months since… @49thestudio really captured the feels with this one. Shoutout to @anusha_r for stealing the shoes before wedding even started. Sorry Kedar for blaming you for the retaliatory shoe theft when it was @alpabasu all along. Maybe one day @kbasu23 and I will finally wear our wedding shoes… Decor: @theperfectknot_ Photography: @49thestudio Clothes: Mohit Kapur, @anitadongre @bhumikasharmaofficial @payalkhandwala @houseofmasaba MUA: @blushinglook_90 Mehendi: @misba_hennaworld

Happy Closing 50B Fam! In honor of our closing performance, and my FOMO at being in NYC instead of MSP right now - check out this amazing lobby display by @morgen_chang that highlights the work of our choreographer and designers in literal boxes of earth!

Happy two months of this much happy ☀️ 🎥: @49thestudio #kitabhshaadi

Baby’s first world premiere is open and running! Thank you @theatermu for being my first 💛 It feels so weird to be back in New York while my genius collaborators in Minneapolis-St. Paul keep on keeping on. I am left to reflect on what was an incredibly fulfilling creative process and the gratitude I feel for this team, and every team before it that brought this play to this point. Scroll through to travel back in time through Mu’s beautiful production photos, followed by a few opening night clicks, tech/rehearsals for this production, then the workshop at PWC, my original garlic girls (gender neutral) at WNPF, and the first workshop at UCSD. Thank you to everyone that touched this play from then to now. My great hope is that I get to see this play in many cities with different styles of puppetry and forms of dance, with different casting configurations and the histories they map onto the text, in times like these when the play feels urgent and in times to come when it feels more like a reminder as it did when I first started writing. We will cycle through these histories time and again, inevitably, forever. But I do hope I get to watch this play someday, somewhere that the people making it feel safe in their selves. Until then, I hope it matters on the road to that place. If you’re in or around the Twin Cities, Fifty Boxes of Earth runs through March 16th at the Park Square Theatre. Production photos by @richryanphoto Director: @ktshorb Choreographer: @ananyachatterjea Puppet design: @okvu.puppets and @triskatonic Set: Mina Kinukawa Props: @rebjomalm Lights: Karin Olson Sound: Kat Horowitz Costumes: @allkindsofawesome SM Team: @kjlavandowska and @cuedash Asst Director: @ssarahmichellee Asst to the Choreographer: @feraira11 Performers: @cialikethey @alexgalick @minasmoua @alyssa.magdalena @taylorw_made @partly_cloud_e @marsniemi._ @klaureano @rulert @otter_absurdity Production Manager: @rae_chal_rae Theater Mu Staff: @katielynnebradley @dresdanh @see__jane @wesleywes16 @morgen_chang Lianna McLernon (I want to tag all my past collaborators too, but this post is apparently too long to fit anymore 😭)

January 10, 2025 🌴 Many more photos featuring all the events to come, but these are some favorites (photos and people) For nephew photos, follow my private account 🙈 Photos by @49thestudio