Watch a live casting couch, secret stand-up set and rap gig at the first anniversary bash of a digital channel that creates Marathi content
Hosts Amey Wagh and Nipun Dharmadhikari with Radhika Apte in the pilot of Casting Couch
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In the pilot of Casting Couch, a Marathi mockumentary-style celebrity talk show inspired by Zach Galifianakis's Between Two Ferns, hosts Amey Wagh and Nipun Dharmadhikari innocuously ask Radhika Apte about her alleged affair with Tusshar Kapoor. They also propose a movie offer, adding that they will share the script on WhatsApp. Her repartee: "I've booked an igloo in Antarctica with Taylor (her husband). I can do the movie in 2020."
The hilarious, politically incorrect episode that went on air last April marked the launch of Bharatiya Digital Party (BhaDiPa), a YouTube entertainment channel that creates Marathi content. This Saturday, you can catch the duo live on the couch with actress Mithila Palkar, known for the web series Girl In The City, as part of an evening celebrating BhaDiPa's first anniversary.
Co-founders Paula McGlynn, Sarang Sathaye and Anusha Nandakumar
Join the party
"Due to the penetration of the Internet in the interiors of India, a vast non-Hindi and non-English speaking audience consumes online content. However, there's barely any regional content, apart from films and music. Our attempt was to fill that gap, so, we started BhaDiPa," shares 34-year-old Sarang Sathaye, who comes armed with 14 years of experience in Marathi theatre, and founded the digital channel with filmmaker Anusha Nandakumar, Canadian filmmaker-actress Paula McGlynn and investors Ashish Mehta and Nachiket Chidgopkar.
With over 54,000 subscribers, the team has released 13 episodes (two seasons) of Casting Couch featuring celebrities like Anurag Kashyap, Imtiaz Ali, Sai Tamhankar, Shriya Pilgaonkar, Shalmali Kholgade and the cast of Sairat, which received over a million views. "The idea was to try a celebrity roast, but in a subtle way. So, we decided to script the web series, and also roped in only those celebrities who were okay with such kind of humour," shares Sathaye.
Mithila Palkar
Ssshh... it's a secret
The event marks the launch of General Alert, a Marathi rap music video by team member and singer-composer Sanket Kanetkar, who will perform it live.
The line-up also includes a secret Marathi stand-up act by a comic, known as an English emcee at open mics. "More than 40 years back, greats such as PL Deshpande were responsible for popularising Marathi stand-up comedy. At one of their live events, AIB even gave an ode to PL Deshpande, calling him the father of stand-up comedy.
Unfortunately, over the years, there have been very few Marathi stand-up comics. Our idea is to spread awareness about it and host more stand-ups in Marathi," says Sathaye, who is also open to the idea of producing content in other regional languages.
Besides hosting more live events in the near future, BhaDiPa also plans to launch a travel show and a fiction web series. "We have realised that there is a huge market for Marathi content. Our viewership base also includes the international community of Maharashtrians as well as viewers in Bangladesh, Canada and France, who watch our shows with help of the auto-subtitle option on YouTube."
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