‘Zollywood’, the film depicting the popular Zadipatti theatre of Vidarbha region, is making the waves abroad. It had made headlines when it won special mention of jury in the Indian Film Festival at Toulouse (France) last year. Now, it has been chosen for screening in the New York Indian Film Festival. “I am so thrilled that our film ‘Zollywood’ has been selected for the New York Indian Film Festival. The film will be screened on MovieSaints. The entire team is so happy,” said Trushant Ingle, who is director of the movie.

 

The movie is the directorial debut of this young man, who was born and brought up in Nagpur and shifted to Mumbai at the age of 16 years to make it big in film industry. ‘Zollywood’ is a tribute to Zadipatti theatre and all the artists who have kept the cultural heritage alive, he added. Ingle used to work in Zadipatti theatre as a child artist in 2005-06. Later, he started working in Nagpur for a while before shifting to Mumbai, where he earned experience in writing and casting. He played the role of Montu in the critically acclaimed movie ‘Budhia Singh -- Born to Run’, and was Casting Associate for ‘Newton’, which was India’s official entry to the Oscars in 2017. ‘Zollywood’ was slated for release in April 2020. However, COVID-19 outbreak and subsequent lockdown disturbed the schedule.

 

The makers planned to release the movie later on, but the pandemic situation lingered on. Now, because of second wave of COVID-19 and curbs on theatres, again the release stands affected. But, Ingle is hopeful that the situation will return to normalcy this year and the movie will be released. Amit Masurkar, who directed films like ‘Sulemani Keeda’ and ‘Newton’, is the Creative Producer for ‘Zollywood’.

 

Ajit Khobragade plays the protagonist Deepak Kale in ‘Zollywood’ and Ashwini Ladekar plays the female lead Poonam. Dinkar Gawande (Narayan Rao), Kajal Rangari (Raja), Anil Uttalwar (Aman), Asawari Naidu (Rajni) make the cast complete. Wishberry Films has produced the movie. In association with Deux Farming Films Priyanka Agrawal, Anshulika Dubey, and Shashwat Singh are the co-producers. Trushant Ingle has written screenplay of the movie.