Stray Factory

Stray Factory is an Indian Independent entertainment company founded on July 17, 2010 by Mathivanan Rajendran as a performing arts company before diversifying into online media in 2014 and independent film in 2017.^[1] Upcoming films include Nirvana Inn (2019) & Nasir (2020).^[2]

After a few scripted plays, the company made a departure from traditional scripted work to devised theatre. The first of which was seen in their 2011 production of Great Indian Blogologues which took blogs from the public and adapted them to stage.

Stray Factory's biggest achievements have been in the short format, particularly at International Short and Sweet festivals, notable plays include My Name is Cine-Ma^[1]Carpouram, Typist with Destiny, Lost Audition, Chairpersons & Maya from Madurai.^[3][4] The group has performed at Short and Sweet Festivals in Sydney, Dubai, Kuala Lumpur and Los Angeles^[5] and at other International festivals such as the Auckland Fringe Festival, The Park New Festival of Contemporary Arts, Hollywood Fringe Festival & National Arts Festival in Grahamstown, Kakiseni Theatre Festival in Kuala Lumpur and the Hindu Metroplus Theatre Festival.^[6]

In 2016, the group was awarded the Emerging Artist Award at the Short and Sweet Festival in Hollywood, California.

A number of Stray Factory's members have forayed into films including Pooja Devariya Mathivanan Rajendran, Rajiv Rajaram, Venkatesh Harinathan. Performers who have worked with the group have transitioned to film like Hiphop Tamizha Lakshmi Priyaa Chandramouli, Rishi Raj, Amzath Khan, Ma Ka Pa Anand and Vidyullekha Raman.

Director M. Manikandan developed short theatre scenes by improvising with the group and represented a fictional version of the group in Andavan Kattalai.

Stray Factory launched Rascalas on YouTube in 2014 in partnership with Culture Machine to focus on South Indian content. The first video was launched on November 4, 2014 and subsequently garnered 2 million views and is widely recognised^{[by whom?]} as the first viral video from South India. In 2016, it produced one of South India's first web series with Black Sheep (2016) and first non-fiction web series, Stray Stories. These shows and other content have been syndicated to several OTT platforms including YuppTV and TVF Play.

Stray Factory's primarily works on International Co-productions having worked with films attached to the Hubert Bals Fund, Asian Project Market, NFDC co-production market and BIFAN IT Project. Current films in production are Nasir & Nirvana Inn.