Post college, I managed the Bangalore branch of Software Education company that went broke. Did a fair share of multi-level-marketing experiments and several freelance projects from making posters and promo videos, radio spots, to copywriting to interior design. It was the work that my Mamu (maternal uncle) Dr. Rajiv Chandra, began to give us, that brought the stable income and regularity. The work of medical transcription, we had a small team of highly trained and qualified professionals and everyone did such an amazing job. I realized that the smartest thing to do was to create systems, such that I became redundant. Luckily that did happen to a great extent and the company was running efficiently even through my self-isolation.
Then comes the one day workshop on filmmaking. I went with a lot skepticism but it was a small risk, just one day. What I did not know was this man, Sanjay Nambiar was to have such a big impact on me. I worked with him for a little more than a year. To most he appeared rude and unlikable, but what I could see in him was authenticity and the love for cinema. From him I learnt the significance of structure, of the deep study and abidance of rules, of the language of cinema. The focus on the craft so that one can better express the art. Did loads of editing work during this time, and totally fell in love with the process of putting pieces together to create a whole new thing, and yes, sound design. Since it was the guerrilla style of filmmaking what I also learnt was that creativity is a function of limitations.
From the long days of shoots where it’s all about sweating, shouting, retakes, and mostly technical stuff with light, lenses, location sound, etc. it was becoming clear that here the human connection was minimal. I did spend time with the actors, but never for long enough to build anything.
Then one day a friend invited me to attend a theatre rehearsal. I had done theatre back in school and in college I read some plays like Waiting For Godot, No Exit and Chairs, and written some too, but I had no idea what a magical space it is. Especially the rehearsal space resonated, as it is the zone where you let go of who you are to become somebody else. This was a slow burn though, rehearsals lasting for months. Here was what I was looking for, a chance to really explore conversation with people.
The choice had to be made. Cinema or Theatre. I chose theatre. You will still see elements of cinema in my plays, if you happened to have watched any. And Sanjay will always hold a very special place in my heart.
With theatre I began at the beginning. Back stage. Quietly observing, learning, working my way up. It was only after I was Assistant Director on a big production that I decided that it is time to take it on fully. The other big reason start a production house was meeting Deevas Gupta on that production. Deevas is a super talented actor and a brilliant poet. He and I started Saarthak Production together. Auditions, writing, rehearsals, marketing, performances, those were some beautiful times. Everyone who connected with Saarthak felt it, you know, being alive. Very soon we had a group of actors who became the company. Although we were all amateur artists, our process, workshops, blocking, set design, sound design, posters, were all top notch. I was a dream partnership, would you believe that we did not fight, even once.
I had written my first full length play, after several drafts, we were ready. The problem was that it was an absurd play and all the processes and methods for rehearsing would not work here. A whole new approach had to be designed. This is when the early draft of what is today the “Nine Steps to Nothing” workshop began to form. For the rehearsal I had to have discussions on philosophy, psychology, art, movies, music and life itself.
The rehearsals and then the shows, were truly astounding. In the sense that here it was, this was the way to cause a radical shift in peoples perspectives and their lives. The play is there on YouTube, although I must confess that theatre does not translate well to the medium of video. That actors that went through this journey insisted that we take the process out, and make it an independent module. By this time a few risky moves had brought the production house a lot of losses. Mutually, Deevas and I called it quits and it was shutter down on Saarthak.
Back to the drawing board and redesigned the module to better suit a general audience and launched it as a three week program.