Entertainment
Disney’s Broadway-style musical to be back in India in April
Mumbai, Feb 27 (IANS) Disney India’s Broadway-style musical based on “Aladdin” will premiere here in April.
Online entertainment ticketing platform BookMyShow is the producer with exclusive rights for the Indian production of the show.
The show will then travel to Delhi and Hyderabad, read a statement.
After scoring a hit with the “Beauty And The Beast” musical in Mumbai and Delhi, Disney India announced last year that they will be bringing the tale of “Aladdin” alive on stage.
The story of “Aladdin” has been re-imagined and developed by Indian talent to make it locally relevant, without losing the original essence of the Broadway show.
Ashish Hemrajani from BookMyShow, Abhishek Maheshwari and Vikrant Pawar from Disney India, on Tuesday unveiled the first look of the musical here.
“It promises to be an extravagant visual feast, filled with music, joy, and loads of theatrical magic,” said Hemrajani, CEO and Founder, BookMyShow.
The enchanting story will be staged by over 50 performers, including Siddharth Menon (Aladdin), Taaruk Raina (Aladdin), Kira Narayanan (Jasmine), Mantra (Genie), Roshan Abbas (Jafar) and Vikrant Chaturvedi (Jafar).
At the helm of the Indian production are Shruti Sharma (director), Shampa Gopikrishna and Bertwin D’Souza (choreographers), Varsha Jain (production designer), Gaviin Miguel (costume designer), Dhruv Ghanekar (music director) and Suzane D’Mello (vocal coach).
Vikranth Pawar, Head – Live Entertainment and Local Content Studio, Disney India, said: “The story of Aladdin has universal appeal and is highly popular with the Indian audiences. The musical is an entertaining celebration of Aladdin’s love for Jasmine and his friendship with Genie.”
Originally produced by Disney Theatrical Productions, the show features music by Tony Award and eight time Oscar winner Alan Menken, lyrics by two-time Oscar winner Howard Ashman and three-time Tony Award and three-time Oscar winner Tim Rice.
In 2015, the “Beauty and the Beast” stage musical mesmerised the audience with its Season I (2015) and Season II (2016) that had local talent.
–IANS
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Entertainment
Casino Days Reveal Internal Data on Most Popular Smartphones
International online casino Casino Days has published a report sharing their internal data on what types and brands of devices are used to play on the platform by users from the South Asian region.
Such aggregate data analyses allow the operator to optimise their website for the brands and models of devices people are actually using.
The insights gained through the research also help Casino Days tailor their services based on the better understanding of their clients and their needs.
Desktops and Tablets Lose the Battle vs Mobile
The primary data samples analysed by Casino Days reveal that mobile connections dominate the market in South Asia and are responsible for a whopping 96.6% of gaming sessions, while computers and tablets have negligible shares of 2.9% and 0.5% respectively.
The authors of the study point out that historically, playing online casino was exclusively done on computers, and attribute thе major shift to mobile that has unfolded over time to the wide spread of cheaper smartphones and mobile data plans in South Asia.
“Some of the reasons behind this massive difference in device type are affordability, technical advantages, as well as cheaper and more obtainable internet plans for mobiles than those for computers,” the researchers comment.
Xiaomi and Vivo Outperform Samsung, Apple Way Down in Rankings
Chinese brands Xiaomi and Vivo were used by 21.9% and 20.79% of Casino Days players from South Asia respectively, and together with the positioned in third place with a 18.1% share South Korean brand Samsung dominate the market among real money gamers in the region.
Cupertino, California-based Apple is way down in seventh with a user share of just 2.29%, overshadowed by Chinese brands Realme (11.43%), OPPO (11.23%), and OnePlus (4.07%).
Huawei is at the very bottom of the chart with a tiny share just below the single percent mark, trailing behind mobile devices by Motorola, Google, and Infinix.
The data on actual phone usage provided by Casino Days, even though limited to the gaming parts of the population of South Asia, paints a different picture from global statistics on smartphone shipments by vendors.
Apple and Samsung have been sharing the worldwide lead for over a decade, while current regional leader Xiaomi secured their third position globally just a couple of years ago.
Striking Android Dominance among South Asian Real Money Gaming Communities
The shifted market share patterns of the world’s top smartphone brands in South Asia observed by the Casino Days research paper reveal a striking dominance of Android devices at the expense of iOS-powered phones.
On the global level, Android enjoys a comfortable lead with a sizable 68.79% share which grows to nearly 79% when we look at the whole continent of Asia. The data on South Asian real money gaming communities suggests that Android’s dominance grows even higher and is north of the 90% mark.
Among the major factors behind these figures, the authors of the study point to the relative affordability of and greater availability of Android devices in the region, especially when manufactured locally in countries like India and Vietnam.
“And, with influencers and tech reviews putting emphasis on Android devices, the choice of mobile phone brand and OS becomes easy; Android has a much wider range of products and caters to the Asian online casino market in ways that Apple can’t due to technical limitations,” the researchers add.
The far better integration achieved by Google Pay compared to its counterpart Apple Pay has also played a crucial role in shaping the existing smartphone market trends.
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