Festival of Academy winning films based on plays

New Delhi: Film adaptations of six popular stage plays which went on to win Academy Awards are set to be screened at a film festival beginning here tomorrow.

"The Philadelphia Story" a two-time Academy winning 1940 film directed by George Cukor is set to open the three-day `Stage Adaptation Film Festival` organised by American Center in collaboration with Cinedarbaar. The film starring Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn with James Stewart is based on the eponymous play scripted by Philip Barry. The classic and much-loved romantic melodrama "Casablanca" by Michael Curtizm that bagged three Academy awards revolves around a sentimental triangular love story set against the backdrop of wartime conflict between democracy and totalitarianism. The 1942 film stars Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman. A dark comedy film by Frank Capra "Arsenic and Old Lace" (1944) based on Joseph Kesselring`s play and featuring Cary Grant is scheduled for the second day. Films scheduled for the last day of the festival are the Academy award winners "A Streetcar Named Desire" by Elia Kazan, a subversive, steamy film classic that was adapted from Tennessee Williams` 1947 Pulitzer Prize-winning play of the same name. The 1951 film casts Marlon Brando and Vivien Leigh. "Deathtrap" a murder mystery by Sidney Lumet based on Ira Levin`s play and "Amadeus" adaptation of Peter Shaffer`s Broadway hit and winner of eight Academy awards directed by Milos Forman is set to mark the end of the festival. The 1982 stars Michael Caine and Christopher Reeve. Stage-to-film adaptations have been popular since the beginning of motion pictures and as the popularity of films grew, Hollywood began borrowing plots as well as actors and directors from Broadway, some of which turned out to be the triumphs and others could not succeed at the Box Office. On some occasions, playwrights re-wrote their stage dramas for the screen, as Peter Shaffer did for Amadeus (1984). The screenings are set to be followed by interactive sessions by scholar and independent filmmaker Anugyan Nag and Kumar Unnayan, a postgraduate student.