[Music]
I am all of 20 years old and I have been
acting since the past 19 and a half
years or so yeah you heard that right
I was the Johnsons baby mm so in many
ways you could say I was a born to do
this
my grandfather wakes up one morning he
sees an ad in the papers and he tells my
mom that they're looking for a fresh
cherub for the new campaign and my mom
decides to not be lazy about it she
takes me for the audition amongst 200
other whaling babies and I land the part
on the basis of me being the happiest
baby of the Lord which is a lie let me
just tell you that I just had a good
appetite so that's my story in a
nutshell a little bit of initiator with
a little bit of persistence and a whole
lot of good fortune by the age of five I
had done over a hundred commercials and
a feature film with the Big B and I was
about to do another one with ahmed khan
and kajol that film being a fauna by the
age of 10 I had done nine feature films
which included a harem partner mashallah
and my friend Ganesha - which wasn't
exactly a box-office smash at the time
but I can tell you one thing it has a
cult following of its own so it works
fine for me I was preparing for a
large-scale soap opera for Star Plus and
in my own tiny way I had experienced
everything that stars get to experience
you know I had cut ribbons I had danced
at birthday parties
I had compared a reality show I was
affiliated with Mattel a toy brand and I
was also fortunate enough to be invited
as a chief guest for some charity
function so life was really good and it
had all just come my way or had it
seemed maybe just maybe it wasn't by
dumb luck you know maybe I had landed up
where I was for a reason being a part of
the movies was undeniably special
exciting and extremely educative I
learned so much about life and waste
sooner than a lot of others my age did
but it wasn't just about being a part of
the movies I had a very personal
connection with stories irrespective of
my involvement with acting and cinema I
grew up listening to them you know from
the silly old stories my grandparents
told mean Gujarati to the eeriness of
Ruskin bonds tiger in the tunnel
told to me by my father to the
spectacular and fascinating saga of
Harry Potter and the visiting world and
to all that pop culture has to offer in
superheroes cartoons princesses and
kingdoms I had absorbed every bit of it
at a very early age perhaps that's why
in my second grade when I would have a
free period I would be ruminating on
these improbable bizarre crossovers
between Shrek Superman the Ninja Turtles
and so on so maybe it was in my accident
maybe my affinity to wanting to tell
stories brought me where I was it was
the unrealized truth within my personal
character arc in the screenplay of my
life but they're often must be a plot
device you'll know what a plot devices
it's uh it's something external which
triggers a realization that is a very
internal and it happened to me on the
sets of galal I was 11 years old and the
show hadn't been doing as well as we had
all imagined it would and one day the
writer called in sick and we had to
shoot an entire episode and we didn't
have a script it had to go on air so
what happens then
one of my co actors Sushant Singh of
Bhagat Singh ping volunteered to write
an entire episode and he did and we shot
it and the TRP rose and it was that
simple and I found me asking myself if
he can why can't you the cheeky little
11 year old I was convinced that I could
have done a fine job too and it just
stuck and suddenly all the years of
listening to stories made sense because
I realized that I wanted to tell stories
through movies and still people in the
same way that I had been stirred growing
up so I set up my own little film school
I picked up the dusty screenplays of fun
and aarambam lying in my bed and I began
writing my own stories in the same
format as though screenplays and I
learned most of it myself
with time Syd field Robert McKee blake
schneider a lot of articles a lot of
video essays and a whole lot of cinema
consumption eventually made me feel like
a reasonably able screenwriter and then
i was introduced to the term networking
in 2015 on a social media application if
you'll have heard of it all the
Millennials in the room ask fm Lord
remember ask fm
throw ask fm I met some really cool
people and we made a very bad short film
that was to this state one of the best
learning experiences of my entire life
and suddenly I had made for such short
films each getting progressively better
the following year in 2016 I co-produced
and co-directed two really successful
plays with big casts and big crews and
all of that jazz I have now a deed on a
film called gold and have since then
written and directed six short films of
which three have been this year and I've
also had three feature films that I
acted and released this year it's been a
fulfilling yet emotionally heavier
because along with growing up and
finding my calling I also found myself
getting exceedingly obsessed with what I
do I live in my stories and it seems
I've spoken enough about my work so now
I'm gonna talk about our theme the
illusion of knowledge and I'm gonna
elaborate on this one time that I
thought I was trapped within my illusion
of knowledge see somewhere around 2
years ago I discovered that I have a
problem ok and it is a bit of a strange
problem to have and I mean this very
literally and not figuratively I can't
live a single day of my life as I go
about my proceedings without thinking
that my life is a movie and I don't mean
this in a way that my life is eventful
and dramatic I legitimately see every
single moment of my life as a scene in a
film or as a part of a film and it makes
me take reality very lightly
it makes me reverent I'm gonna use an
example to highlight how grave my
problem is you see my friends and I we
often talk about conspiracy theories
like the Mandela effect or the bob lazar
area 51 3 or your regular intellectual
masturbation and sometimes we all seem
driven to know the truth you know how
does the world function how does the
universe make things happen which is
good because I mean it's insightful but
I only want to know this truth because
you don't make for a goddamn engaging
movie that's all for me the lines
between fact and fiction are very
and that's God's honest truth I have
background score in my head all the time
even with my relationships when the
going is good I have warm and fuzzy
montage music in my head and when it's
bad it gets kind of Adele ish kinda
Arijit ish sometimes it goes all the way
to judge eat sing and the sorry brothers
and all that but let's keep that aside
yeah
even with my relationships I have often
been with someone that I believe wasn't
exactly the best for me but I
nevertheless stayed in that relationship
because I stupidly enough thought that
one day our story would be a romance for
the ages yeah on on a lot of days when I
don't have motivation to get through I
just keep telling myself that one day
your life will be made into a
commercially successful and critically
acclaimed biopic and I'm like okay cello
Escada nickels IRA so that's me I can't
tell the difference between what's real
and what's a movie and off late you know
this year my thoughts really began to
bother me William Shakespeare anyone
that damn playwright I love him and he
said something he said all the world's a
stage and the men and women merely
players now I don't have to give what he
said too much thought because he said it
and I was like okay whatever but then it
struck me that if all the world is a
stage and the men and women merely
players then where do we as artists fit
in we are the we are the actors in the
creators within a larger stage right
that means the people that run countries
and maintain order in the world they're
the real players they're running the
show so what are we are we just filler
performances is it like we just exist to
sell impractical dreams and distract
people by buying making them buy into
the illusions of emotions that we
manipulatively Taylor it can't be that
because I've spent my entire life in
this field and Here I am believing that
you know my life is a movie or
everything in my life should be made
into a movie and to think that my choice
of line and my means to voice my
thoughts may just be so fickle and
irrelevant in the larger scheme of
things is horrifying my illusion of
knowledge me finding relevance in my
universe through the stories I write the
pictures I make and the people I play
but what if none of that matters at all
you've heard you've heard the saying
theater imitates life but if the world
is a stage
what if we have been living life
imitating the theater around us you know
when you've dedicated all your life to a
certain field and you've grown in it and
you've grown with it and you've been
known and loved for your contributions
to it and you know that they couldn't be
any other way for you to possibly
express yourself and then to ponder over
whether it is important at all or not is
a bit rejecting because art for me is a
mirror to society but if I'm simply
holding up a mirror to the observable
truths around me am i making change
that's the question you know does my
short film hitting 25,000 views on
YouTube matter my art however
well-intentioned or honest I may believe
it to be is it making a difference to
the lives of people like somebody that
is an inventor or a leader a change
maker maybe an activist
these are nerve-racking 3 a.m. thoughts
where I feel optimistically nihilistic I
feel purposeless I feel like a speck in
the universe that'll just get lost into
oblivion and I don't want that to happen
so I searched I searched for an answer
and that's when I find it because great
screenplays too often have something
called a logical loophole and I cracked
it and it baffles me how I didn't see it
all along because the answer lies in the
question so let's go really slow now
okay
William Shakespeare said all the world's
a stage and the men and women are merely
players which say that one more time all
the world's a stage and the men and
women are merely players so I as one of
the men and women am playing a part too
which means that I ought to have a
designated audience because I am on the
stage too and that is a full 360 in
perspective because that's when you
realize that
your work matters maybe not to millions
but to hundreds tens or to that one
person that you can deeply affect your
art matters because you're on the stage
too and simply by that logic you have an
audience tool every time I wanted to
make a short film I was questioned and
when the short film didn't do as well as
I wanted it to do I questioned myself
but I know that I couldn't have possibly
been standing here today without all the
failed short films that didn't do as
well as I wanted them to do me standing
here is proof of that so to everyone
that has a lot to say but fears over
whether that's what someone needs to
hear or not say it nevertheless make
that short film start your YouTube
channel write that blog post go for that
audition get that portfolio made just
play your part and don't ask too many
questions because you are where you are
for a reason and that's what I believe
you know just the way I found my calling
and filmmaking the same way every artist
out there is doing what they're doing
because of the way they gravitate
towards their form and that process is
the best part that connect that an
artist has with his form is magical you
know it's where fact and fiction gets
blurred for me it's a transcendent trip
so if we're all on a stage as Billy
believes then let's play our parts with
sincerity let's be methodical and let's
you not really embrace the process of
honing our respective crafts and if we
do so will not only be satisfied but
will also be lauded by our respective
audiences no matter how big or small an
artist holding up a mirror to society is
also making change by having people
reflect on themselves I don't know how I
seem to miss that so we may not be
inventors but we have a part to play too
so let's do it right let's internalize
our part let's understand what we're
seeking and then let's express it with
sheer conviction and get it right
because in both theater and in life
there are no retakes but there are
retakes and movies which is why I will
continue making them for as long as I am
around so ladies and gentlemen on a
closing note I would just like to say
that your knowledge matter
don't be disillusioned by ourselves you
are an indispensable part of the artists
food chain and lastly always remember
Rahan absurd jitna PR cotta Ethne PR
apprehension a curtain thank you
[Applause]