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About the Show
At what point do you follow morals over orders? This darkly comic play explores how unexamined adherence to leadership can drive you to stifle what makes you most human. Set in a fictionalized 1648 India, two Imperial Guards watch from their post as the sun rises on the newly-completed Taj Mahal for the first time—an event that shakes their respective worlds. When they are ordered to perform an unthinkable task, the aftermath forces them to question their very ideas of beauty, loyalty, and even their own friendship. A wry and haunting examination of blind obedience.
If You’re Into:
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Abbott and Costello (but with more gore)
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'Animal Farm' if Key & Peele wrote it
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Severance absurdism
Expect:
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A buddy comedy that goes wrong
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Blood, Beauty, and a really bad day at work
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Dreaming of futures while reckoning with the past
Run Time:
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90 minutes with no intermission
Special Events:
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Topical Talkback with Donkeysaddle Project - Friday, Apr 3 after the 8pm performance. The conversation will center on topics of community organization, local activism against authoritarianism, and abolition.
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Artist Talkback with the Director and Sound Designer - Saturday, Apr 4 after the 8pm show
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Under 40 Happy Hour - Friday, Apr 17 starting at 7pm
Audience Advisory:
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This production contains theatrical blood and gore, simulated violence, and flashing lights.
Meet the Artists
Rajiv Joseph, Playwright
Rajiv Joseph is an American playwright and screenwriter known for his thought-provoking and emotionally charged works. His play Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo was a 2010 Pulitzer Prize finalist for Drama and marked his Broadway debut. He has twice won the Obie Award for Best New American Play, first in 2016 for Guards at the Taj (also a 2016 Lortel Winner for Best Play) and then, in 2018, for Describe the Night. Other plays include Dakar 2000, King James, Letters of Suresh, Gruesome Playground Injuries, Animals Out of Paper, The North Pool, The Lake Effect, Archduke and Mr. Wolf. Rajiv has been a Steppenwolf Theater Ensemble member since 2018. Rajiv is a graduate of Cleveland Heights High School in Cleveland Heights, Ohio. He received his Bachelor’s Degree from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and his MFA from New York University’s Tisch School for the Arts. He served for three years in the Peace Corps in Senegal, West Africa.
Mekala Sridhar, Director
Mekala Sridhar is a DC based theatre director, playwright, and producer. Her directing credits include Nothing You Desire (workshop) at Atlas Arts Lab, A Wake At Singh's (workshop) at Prologue Theatre, Frederick Douglass Project (reading) Hakawatis (reading) at Solas Nua, Salome and 10708 at Sarah Lawrence College and (re)Move West at Accademia Dell'Arte. Select associate directing credits include Public Obscenities at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company and Theatre For A New Audience, Metamorphoses and Twelfth Night at Folger Theatre.
Mekala’s artmaking is grounded in creating radically inclusive, collaborative work, with a central focus on transforming the institutions she engages with into more equitable, community-centered spaces.
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Mekala holds a BA in Theatre, Literature, and Psychology from Sarah Lawrence College and received additional training from Moscow Art Theatre School and Accademia dell’Arte. www.mekalasridhar.com
Viabhav Taparia, Humayun, he/him
Viabhav is a South African actor of South Asian descent based in New York City. He is honoured to be part of Guards at the Taj, a play that feels especially meaningful to him, given the fascination he grew up with around the lure and mythology of the Taj Mahal & Mughal Empire. His acting credits include Witch by Jen Silverman at the ASDS Repertory Theatre, Flaco at East Village Basement, Cyrano Redux at Theater for the New City, and readings of Wildfire at La MaMa and Slash/Her at Loading Dock Theatre. He earned his MFA in Acting from the Actors Studio Drama School at Pace University and also trained classically at LAMDA. He is a finalist at the Actors Studio. vaibhavtaparia.com @vaibtaparia
Vish Shukla, Babur, he/him
Vish is so excited to be making his NextStop debut! He is incredibly grateful for this amazing team and all their work. Make sure to show them some love! Other roles include Drunk Shakespeare DC: Drunk Dracula, Drunk Romeo and Juliet; Keegan Theatre: Apropos of Nothing; Folger Theatre: DC, I Love You. Vish is a proud alum of American University. vishshukla.com @vishhhshukla