What’s next now for this musical maverick?

The world is not enough! But the world will have to do. AR Rahman embarks on a Global journey, which starts from the US, goes on to Europe, comes back to the US, then the Far East.
For the viewers who saw the first set of shows in the East Coast of the US, their opinions varied, what did not, was the unanimous consent that, as Indian/Bollywood shows go, this one has a character, a grandeur and a razzmatazz, quite distinct from anything that has been seen before.
Here is a quick break with AR Rahman, as he readies for the next show on the agenda

When did the idea of the tour come about?

After the Oscars we were planning an album. During that time, we started to get a lot of inquiries for a tour. But I did not want to do just another show. We have done shows for the past few years but this time we wanted to attempt something new and more creative. So Sam, my agent in Hollywood suggested we team up with some of the best talent in Hollywood and brainstorm on the show content and form. Around this time, Deepak Gattani came to the rescue of spearheading the whole effort. He has been a television director for 13 years and was gracious enough to step into the role of a producer and help put this whole tour together. About five months ago, we synergized our creative energies, which in turn lead to a jamming session in LA. Thus the tour conceptualized. We had the first set of sellout performances  in New York, Atlantic City, DC and Chicago. We had planned to cover all the major metros across the US and Canada. Due to an unfortunate accident in Detroit, prior to the show, we had to postpone the remainder of the North American tour, to September 2010.  We are now ready to embark onto Europe.

Was there a specific need to connect with the people of North America, given that some of your greatest artistic recognitions have come from here (the US)?

Yes ! Also a lot of people here (US) were inquisitive about AR Rahman the person and his music. So these shows were a means to communicate with them. The content of the show is not genre specific. The audience will be treated to fresh shifts in content, during the course of the show, to keep it invigorating. It has been designed to have the cumulative look and feel of a rock, classical and dramatic performance.

US, Europe, where next?

If all goes per plan, towards the end of the year we travel to the Eastern hemisphere, Singapore, Malaysia, India, Middle East, etc.

As a performer what gives you a greater high, live performances or recordings?

I think both. When you are recording, you are almost non- existent, only your spirit exists, but while performing, your whole physical self needs to be present and you have to be spontaneous, so both are very challenging in their own ways.

Any forthcoming compositions that will debut in this tour?

Since the tour was planned 4-6 months ago, it will have very few new numbers but will have many of the classic and recent ones. The set of songs have been carefully selected, and the singers have been trained, keeping in mind the show in its entirety.

Over to Uday:

Talk a little about the return from New York, from a Music perspective, why back to India and why now?
The answer to that question is not music-related. I moved back to Bombay to try and make indie-style films. I’d written a couple of scripts (both based in India), one of which started to get some traction, so I moved back because the only way to get it done is to be present. The urge to get up on stage and make some music seems impossible to stanch for me, so I keep doing it.

Whirling Kalapas- what kind of music can we expect and where do you want to take the group?
Whirling Kalapas is what I consider my acoustic side project. Ok, so you’re going to ask me what my main project is now. I don’t know…yet But with WK I feel a deep sense of peace and fulfillment every time I get up on stage. To get into those quiet moments that we do…I’ve long aspired for that. A bit hard with electric bands. WK delves into those quiet spaces; we explore all kinds of tonalities through acoustic guitars, mandolin, violin, lush vocal harmonies. And every now and then we just funk it out. Where would I like to take the group? To planets heretofore undiscovered.

From being the recognizable Rock Machine and then Indus Creed, to struggling in New York with Alms For Shanti, struggling, cause the environment and the audience had changed, talk a little about the desire to move West in the first place and about your overall experience there (NY)?
The years with Rock Machine and Indus Creed were amazing. Also insane, bizarre and ulcer-causing. But in toto it was just a fantastic ride. At some point, though, some of us started to move in different directions musically. I wanted to move in a different direction geographically too—I was sick of living in Bombay by then. The city was getting more frustrating to be in, the music biz had changed in ways that we hated and I wanted to make a kind of music that India wasn’t, I believed, ready for. Rather than try and stuff it down an unwilling throat I chose to go in search of the audience for that sound. Jayesh Gandhi, also from Indus Creed, felt in much the same way, so we both decided to head for New York and start a new band with a new sound.
Our years in New York were fabulous. Like Bombay, NYC can be pretty unforgiving—you’ve got to have your shit together or it’s not going to work for you. Musically it was very fulfilling as we found a great bunch of musicians that become Alms For Shanti. With AFS we weren’t looking for stardom of any kind. Jayesh and I had set out to make the kind of music that we wanted to make, irrespective of the commercial implications. I have no regrets there. I loved New York; I still do. It’s as much home as Bombay—sometimes more. I loved the anonymity, the environment, the openness. I miss it often.

Desire to do playback for Bollywood?
I like to sing, period. I’m very open to doing Bollywood tunes but I’d prefer to do the kind of songs that I’m comfortable with. When Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy played me the scratch for “Life Is Crazy” from the film Wake Up Sid, the decision to do it was instant. I loved the song, they’re guys I’ve known for a long time and am very comfortable working with. When more Bollywood work comes along I hope it’s like that song—fresh, catchy and fun to do.

State of the music industry when you left India, to where we are now?
Worse in some ways, better in others. The worst part of the music scene in India today is the absence of dedicated music channels. It’s hard for a band to get their music out there. But in other ways it’s easier. Now there’s MySpace, Facebook, YouTube and the like. Technology has made it easier to record at home. But the onus lies on the bands to market themselves, a task most musicians suck at. Which is the reason for record companies to exist. But the labels here suck as much, if not more, at that function, so it’s all a bit of a mess. The live scene has improved in many ways. There are a bunch of live music clubs—and still growing—all across the country. And they all want bands to come and play their own music. That’s progress to me.

Throwing up the Hotel Mgmt for a music career, any regrets looking back, anything you would do different?
Ha ha ha, no regrets at all on kicking the “bright future” in hospitality. The 10 days I spent working as a hotel trainee after I graduated from hotel school made that decision much, much easier. And I was already in Rock Machine, so the choice was obvious. No regrets, man. A full-time musician is what I was meant to be and I’m only grateful that I’ve been able to do that. And all the experiences that followed from that decision have been great, even the times when things weren’t going so well. Because that’s what life is—sometimes it goes according to plan and sometimes it doesn’t (though I suspect it’s all part of the plan, really). Life’s experiences—good and bad—are all good. Everything teaches…if you let it.

Additionally feel free to add anything else you want to communicate to the readers.
Um, not much more to add to that. I’m lucky for the life I’ve had and the life I still have. Everyone should feel that way

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We catch up with Noureen on her upcoming challenges:

What made you take up the acting profession?
Acting has always been my passion.

What was it like being a part of an Oscar winning short?
It was an incredible experience. Especially since “West Bank Story” was my first film…my first starring role, for it to go on and win an Oscar was just completely unexpected.

Being South Asian American, what challenges and opportunities does Hollywood present to you?
This is a very complicated question that I cannot answer simply. It is a challenging journey for an ethnic actress in Hollywood as stereotypes are very hard to escape and an ethnic actor/actress has to know how to find a balance between playing characters as they are written and just enjoying the simplicity of that choice versus examining the material to see what the fallout reaction to your character will be (if any) in society…

Would Bollywood be a world, that might interest you and would language be an issue?
I would certainly entertain the idea of doing a Bollywood film if the right script and role were presented to me. I would love to work in Hindi/Urdu, as I did speak it growing up, I would love to perform in a film with Hindi or Urdu. There is something very beautiful about our South Asian languages and I would be thrilled to use it in a film.

Talk a little about your upcoming projects, in both films and television?
A) “The Back Up Plan” stars Jennifer Lopez and is a romantic comedy, in the film I play Daphne, her friend who works in her pet store. “The Taqwacores” based on the novel of the same name is about Yusef, an undergrad who moves into a house of Muslim Punk Rockers. In the film I play Rabeya a punk rock riot girl who wears a Burkha as her punk rock statement. I’m also recurring on a new MTV comedy called Hard Times of RJ Berger as Claire. And I’m also recurring on TNT’s “Hawthorne” starring Jada Pinkett Smith.

From a medium perspective, television or feature films, which is your preferred choice and why?
A) As far as TV I love it. I love how fast people can see your work. The final product is based directly on the script. As far as films, well films are forever and that is special. Both have their own unique advantages, I really don’t have a preference, I just love to play interesting characters.

You do realize that a film such as Semshook, is not your typical Bollywood film and there are going to be challenges and despite that, you probably knowingly took this path…why?
See I do have a Bollywood career already, I’ve signed a couple of Hindi films, I’ve made one, which was slightly off Bollywood, I do a lot of Television and am working with Yash Raj right now in Television, that being said, I studied film, to tell stories that have resonance, not just to Indians but around the world. And I think this is a story like that. It’s a universal theme. It’s really a spiritual film which mirrors the life of the Buddha, of going for the search of himself and divesting himself of all the possessions in the process. In the film too, the protagonist, to discover who he is and his Tibet, has to leave everything behind and he ends up with not even a piece of cloth on his body.

The Bay Area has a huge Tibet support group. So what motivated you to select the Cinequest, San Jose festival, as the one you wanted to showcase your film?
We are completely maverick filmmakers in that sense the producer pretty much used his own money, we don’t have any Sales Agent or any Hollywood backing so we would probably have got lost in the bigger festivals. And for a film such as this, we needed to build better traction, amongst friendlier festivals and given that Cinequest in one of the top ten festivals in the US, and it’s also known as being a really friendly festival. The founders and organizers are here all the time, and that’s the kind of handholding that we need at this stage, with a film that is so sensitive and so small.

Since Let’s Enjoy, where have you disappeared?
Let’s Enjoy was also made with a maverick manner. The movie was made on a very limited budget with basically all my friends. Since I was living in Delhi at that time, I didn’t understand anything about Bollywood, back then. Two years after that I moved to Mumbai and have been working on cracking the system, knowing that it’s a very tough system to crack. There are certain zamindars whose families are in charge and to crack that system it takes a long time. So I’ve had a couple of abortive attempts at film and now I’m working with the biggest production house in the country, so I will be making something sooner or later, but have done a lot of Television in the interim.

Let’s Enjoy had a freshness of characters not seen in Bollywood, as you become a part of Bollywood how are you going to retain your freshness?
My primary purpose is to be an artist, to express myself through what I’m given. Bollywood very often, you don’t have complete control over your script. If you get a call from the top guy and are told to direct a script of their choosing, you can turn it down, but it would be stupid to do so. After that your job is to sit with the writer and fuel your artistic personality into the script. So if you do see my work as a Bollywood feature, you will probably see something original. How original not sure, there will be so many cooks in that broth, it’s going to get a little like a khichdee.

Roshni, what was the struggle as someone involved from outside, in the making of the film?
The struggle begins now, to get it out there, to get people to support it. While making the film, we all totally believed in it.

Roshni Chopra is your typical mainstream television, good, bad or ugly, Semshook is not, so how come the decision to come out and support it, glad that you are putting your two cents there, but is it going to cause any confusion to the audience, thinking this is a mainstream Bollywood film?
I think whatever fills the seats. It’s all for a good cause and as long as the intent is good, that’s what matters.

Questions with Sudip Sharma, the writer of the film.

From Superstar to Abbas Mastan, to Semshook?
Always wanted to do different kind of stuff. I am a MBA by education and was working in Sales and Marketing, somewhere down the line realized this is not for me and I switched to cinema, which in Mumbai means Bollywood. Like to believe that I am a world cinema buff so would like to operate in that field and not restrict myself to Bollywood. I do enjoy Bollywood cinema and am working on the remake of the Italian Job for Abbas Mastan. Will also be working on Siddharth’s next film. So looking for a balance in the kind of scripts that I write and do.

As a writer for Semshook, how much of it was picked up from the real world and how much is make believe?
A lot of it was real because the genesis of the story is from an activist and poet in Dharamsala called Tenzing. So we had the sniff of his story from him and his book of poetry. So the idea was to take it to another level and make it cinematic, so not stopping at where his story stops. A lot of it is real and a lot of it is also from the experiences we had in Dharamsala. The window that opened up to me, when I was in Dharamsala, have been incorporated into the film.

It is best seen and enjoyed, and yes it does have it’s entertaining moments, if one goes into the theater with a mentality of entering a video game parlor. It keeps you distracted from the mundane tasks, but the absurdity of the action sequences and the lack of story, make it a quasi game experience, as opposed to a real movie, one.

The action sequences, especially from, Aruna Shields, are classy. When women actors do action sequences well, it is like watching a gymnast and let’s face it, women gymnast appear more graceful, as opposed to the men counterpart and one often wonders, why Bollywood does not make women oriented action films.

The music and background score are engaging. From an acting perspective, Vivek is competent, Nandana and Neetu are not and Sanjay Kapoor attempts to get into Anil Kapoor of RACE’s, character. However, what is really weak is the story telling and the direction. While not a BLUE or a TASHAN, this is another attempt at Bollywood using the money at it’s disposal to blindly ape Hollywood in all special effect sequences, but forgetting about telling a real story in the process. It makes it also painful since the thrill and suspense element is missing from the soul, but is visible to the eye.

While escapism and fantasy is the very core of the film entertainment business, have some basic intelligence and flow to the make believe, as opposed to putting in twists, then explaining to the audience, time and again, makes the narrative extremely jarred.

Overall an average watch, if the stress of living is getting to you and your family.

How did SOCH LO happen?
I met Sartaj in Oct. 07 for this project. After passing out from FTII, I was looking for work as an independent DOP. Sartaj gave me this project, which I thought was a perfect chance to show my skill. So I was the first technical crew member to join “Soch Lo”.

Is this your first feature film?
Yes, “Soch Lo” is my first feature film. I liked the script very much.

What were the challenges that you faced while working for this film?
The main obstacle was the budget of the film as Sartaj himself was producing it, without any back up from the industry. So we decided that we will give our best results in the available budget . We worked extensively for almost 3 months before starting the shoot in Jan 08.
As the budget was very tight, I couldn’t get many advanced equipments. What we could manage is a track trolley, a car rig & a 22 feet crane. Even the lights were normal HMI’s instead of Arri PARs. All these factors were there but we decided that we won’t allow these factors to hamper our film.

SOCH LO has a very distinct look and feel.  Was it designed that way or the locations inspired you?
Before post graduating from FTII, I did my graduation from Sir JJ School of art which helped me a lot to design the look of the film. Even Sartaj was ready to try something new visually. So we both worked hard on designing the look. Also we decided to mix the formats super 16 & super 35 for different portions of the film, which also gives distinctive look to the film.

Now that the film is ready for release, when you look back how has the journey been?
When I look back now, I feel you give your best in limitations, I am very happy about the look of the film & the visual design. Till date I am connected to this film& as I told u earlier I was the first technical crew member to join in Oct 07. So it was a big struggle for all of us to complete this film. This film is very close to all of us.

What are the other projects that you working on?
After finishing “Soch Lo” I shot four more features. My second film is with Mr. Saeed Mirza, who made a film after almost 12 years, titled “Ektho Chance”. Then I shot a Marathi feature “Target” with two new directors Vivek Gore & Rajesh Kolan. Then a French production “Virgin Goat” Directed by Murali Nair. My recent film is a Marathi film “Arre Baap re.” with Sanjay Narvekar. All of them are planned to release in next few months. It would be great if my first film “Soch Lo” releases first, as it’s very close to me & we have worked hard to complete it. I hope the Indian audience will enjoy our genuine efforts without any big star cast.

EXT & INT: The Man Who Dreamt And The Man Who Dared!

Bollywood has some of the most difficult barriers, mostly built by it’s self enacted gatekeepers, in any industry in any part of the globe. Filmi families, old school thinking, star fascination despite incurring a loss of Rs 3500 crore in 2009, casting couch, irrational thought processes, etc, etc.

The higher the barriers, the greater the thrill in overcoming them. The few who dare, don’t think about consequences, they just dare and do. Sometime back we had done a write up on one such individual, Sartaj Singh Pannu and his whole struggle to take a bunch of freshers, an experienced actress who is known to be selective in what she does, some great music and aspire to do a film, which was small, but not specifically Arthouse or festival obsessed, but one that aspired to reach the audience. A commercial film, whose strength was good scripting and good music. That was Sartaj Singh Pannu gate crashing Bollywood, http://www.indianentertainment.info/2009/08/16/sartaj-singh%e2%80%a6-gate-crashing-bollywood.html

Now he sits on the entrance!

There is a very good chance that the film is going to hit the theaters very shortly. Now, in what is probably a first in reporting, we follow his and his team’s thought process as they look back and look forward.

A reflection of an arduous journey, or anticipation of upcoming excitement, or both.

A real and hard look at what it takes to get that commercial film made in Bollywood.

Let’s start with the captain of the ship, the MAN WHO DREAMT AND WHO DARED- SARTAJ SINGH PANNU

What is it about film making that makes you put everything on line?

I want to express myself, filmmaking is a channel to my voice, be it personal voice, artistic or social

Then what made you choose entirely fresh people, under a new banner, a new director ..where the trade pundits would say its a “suicidal project ?”

Be it big corporate, small producer, or wannabe film financer all of them give you the same “ gyan “. Then they react “ all fresh students ? new banner? new director? It has never happened in our industry, “you atleast need to have Star Son” audience love  watching a  new comer only if he/she  is from  star stable . or  you should at least have  a big banner or big director attached to new comers,  don’t waste other people’s money you wont even be able to complete the film , “if you  mange to  complete the film than  no is going release it, and if u mange to release than  no one is going  watch it !”

Well!

So I made fresh  team and decided to  make a very engaging, New  Age, a beautifully shot film that will hold them for two hours,  a kind of  film our generation next  is waiting for

I found my own space, made  my own path   so that   others can also traverse into it when they find out that one man had already passed through it… it is possible…

When is your film SOCH LO scheduled for release?

We are looking at April release, probably towards the end of April, .will take a call on exact date with my distributor by end of March

Now that you look back how was the journey?

Risky, at every point I was tested, had to be innovative, be it in fund raising, direction, production, or marketing. I was challenged at every step.  I realized that I have gained strength out of these challenges and risks .It really gives me a high now.

Take Ben Kingsley, Amitabh, along with fine individual performances by Madhavan, Shraddha Kapoor, Dhruv Ganesh and Siddharth Kher and you have potential, to make the potential even more promising is a fine underlying concept, now throw in a director and a storyteller, who have taken it upon themselves to bore the audience with going deep into unnecesary details, suddenly realizing that they are getting monotonous, fast forwarding to an action sequence, which seems forced, having characters go through inconsistencies in who they are, and if that is not confusing enough, take the traditional Bollywood like Ajay Devgan, Jackie Shroff and Mahesh Manjrekar. To complete the “excess casting” also throw in Saira Mohan and Shakti Kapoor and waste a talent like Barry John and you have Teen Patti.

Haven’t seen such a desperation to win the audience and lack of clarity in a movie in some time. Ironically none of that was required.  Ben and Amitabh have actually performed very well, but given that the whole story around which they have to act, is all over the place, there isn’t much they can do.

The item number is unnecessary as are half the characters in the film and you wonder what they are doing in it, in the first place. It is like building an argument when the conclusion is a given, but you cannot reconstruct what got you there in the first place. What is described as Mathematics appears to be all about intuition and the logic is never clearly defined, other than “it is somewhere in the cloud.”  Clearly this film is not for lesser mortals like the audience, but seems more to be a mind play of some of the lowest IQ pretending to be, super intelligent. The whole experience is like going to a Page 3 party and seeing right through everyone.

If there is a positive, it is that something different is being attempted, although that too is a pav bhaji of a couple of Hollywood films, being dished in and dished out and then some Bollywood coming into play, then London.

Watch this taking your Ipod, cellphone, videogame, food, etc along, you’ll need that.