Born in 1962, Prasanna Vithanage's opus of five previous films has made him one of Sri Lanka 's leading filmmakers with a worldwide critical and popular reputation. He began his career in the 1980's as a theatre director. He translated into Sinhala and directed Bernard Shaw's "Arms and the Man" in 1986 and Dario Fo's "Raspberries and Trumpets" in 1991, before setting out as a filmmaker in 1992. Despite his busy schedules, Vithanage also devotes some serious time and effort to the education and training of young people in the art and business of filmmaking. He returned to his theatrical roots in 2006 when he wrote, directed and produced two hugely popular Sinhala one act plays "Horu Samaga Heluwen" which ran to nearly 150 performances islandwide.These were based on his own translation of two short plays of Dario Fo ('The Virtuous Burglar" and "One Wore a Suit and One Wore Tails"). Vithanage also produced Uberto Pasolini's "Machan", the international co-production, which debuts at the Venice International Film Festival in Summer 2008.