Hone Your Drama Skills With Top Acting Course in Mumbai, India

Arvind Pandey

Faculty

Mr. Arvind Pandey is an alumnus of NSD, New Delhi. Post his PG from NSD, he had done a research on ‘Method Acting’ under the aegis of NSD and subsequently studied acting at the Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute,USA. His association with Whistling Woods International began in 2006 as faculty in the acting department while it was headed by Mr. Naseeruddin Shah. His experience of acting in films, television and theatre spans across two decades. Mr. Pandey has taught acting at almost all top-ranking film and drama schools in the country. Besides acting and teaching he has also written, adapted screenplays and directed them. At present he heads the department of Acting.

Atul Bali

Faculty

Mr. Bali started working in plays for INT (Indian National Theater) and has also worked with Marathi theater artists. He was a full-length play co-writer that was performed in the National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA). Atul Bali has completed Advance Actors training under Mr. Barry John and has worked in experimental plays under the guidance of Pandit Satyadev Dubey. Through his years of journey, he gained experience in various fields like writing, acting, filmmaking, etc. Thereafter, he explored working in the industry behind the camera in various ad films, films with the likes of Rajkumar Hirani films, Vinod Chopra Films. His love for the art pulled him back towards acting after which he got trained to become a professional acting mentor and chose the path of spreading his knowledge. When not teaching he is busy writing and directing his own short films and his current experimental film is in the post-production stage. Atul has a strong knowledge of various acting methods and has been teaching for 9 years now. He believes that we all are students of life.

Kenneth Desai

Visiting Faculty

Kenneth Desai has been teaching acting at Whistling Woods International since its inception in 2006 as a part of the original core team formed by Naseeruddin Shah. He has also been a visiting faculty at the FTII and the Stardust Academy.

Kenneth Desai has an acting career spanning over four decades and he’s been an acting coach for the last 15 years as well. He’s an alumnus of St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai, from where he graduated with a degree in English Literature and Psychology and the National School of Drama where he finished as class Valedictorian. He has been working on the Mumbai stage since 1980 and also across different mediums like film, OTT, television and as a voice artist. He teamed up with Whistling Woods International’s alumnus Abhishek Jain for the acclaimed Gujarati film, Kevi Rite Jaish (2012) which earned him the award of Best Actor in a Supporting role, conferred by the Government of Gujarat. Other significant works of his include Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam (1999), Munnabhai M.B.B.S (2003), Mother Teresa of Calcutta (2003), Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania (2014), Raag Desh (2017) and Scam 1992: The Harshad Mehta Story (2020) to name a few. He has been part of international projects on stage and on screen and has worked in multiple languages. He’s been associated with Naseeruddin Shah’s theatre group Motley since 1981.

Tamara P Nedungadi

Visiting Faculty

Tamara P Nedungadi is a Postgraduate in Sociology from Mumbai University. She had an exposure to cinema right from childhood as her father was an eminent Film critic. Her passion for the visual medium got an impetus when she did the Film Appreciation course of FTII in 1986.

After her post-graduation, she joined renowned Film Editor Renu Saluja in 1990. Amongst the films she assisted Renu were films such as ‘Sardar’, ‘Dharavi’ and ‘Maya Memsaab.’ She decided to expand her horizons and became an assistant director to renowned filmmakers Ashutosh Gowarikar and Kundan Shah.

In the Mid 1990’s she started her independent career as an online editor (vision mixer) for multi camera TV Shows. Some of the shows she edited were ‘Swabhimaan’, ‘Farz’ and ‘Nyay’. She got her first break as a Director for a TV show titled ‘Waaris’ in 1999. She then went on to direct many shows over the next 12 years. Some of the shows she directed were, ‘Jassi Jaisi Koi Nahi’, ‘Kittie Party’, ‘Remix’.

Apart from her career as a Director and Editor, she is trained in Oddissi dance form under Guru Jhelum Paranjpe. She has performed in dance ballets and shows, choreographed by dancers like, Astad Deboo and Illeana Chirasti.

She has also been part of Satyadev Dubey and Sunil Shanbag’s plays like ‘Andha Yug’ and ‘Pratibimb’. Her association with these stalwarts helped her understand Stagecraft and nuances of speech and performance.

Ankit Varshneya

Visiting Faculty

Ankit Varshneya studied Computer Engineering from Army Institute of Technology, Pune but decided to pursue his passion by taking up Lee Strasberg’s method of acting for two years from Rob Reece at Whistling Woods International. He has played the lead in feature films as Mithyam, Kaansya, and Alien and short films like Scared To Be Alone, Unmothered, Shunyata, Check In, Rab Da Vaasta, Amidst Dark, and Savita and acted in the Theatre play Manto Mantra (2012- 14) and performed all over India. Ankit Varshneya also featured in various Public Service Ads, YouTube series, and Television series.

Anil Mange

Visiting Faculty

Anil Charanjeett, an alumnus of Whistling Woods International, Actors’ Studio, is an Indian film actor, who predominantly performed in the Hindi Film Industry. Anil has acted in several movies such as PK, Raees, Singh Is Bling, Hasee Toh Phasee, Shershaah, Sooryavanshi, Mubarakan, Golmaal Again, and more and made an appearance in the song “Main Badhiya Tu Bhi Badhiya” from the movie Sanju the biopic of actor Sanjay Dutt.