My short film "Closet Supes" to screen on 9/29 at Tasveer South Asian Film Festival in Seattle!

September 24, 2019 in Film, Acting, TV, Art

Closet Supes is a short film I made in response to a competition prompt that invited Asian-Americans to make a film examining our unique perspectives as children of Asian immigrants in today’s America. This was an opportunity for me to turn the lens inward on my personal life and tell an atypical immigrant tale of loss, forgiveness, and identity as it is influenced by family, both the kind we are born into and the families we choose. The story is loosely based on my relationship with my step-brother and our mutual love for comic books.

After months of post-production, I’m thrilled to announce that Closet Supes will be screening at the largest South Asian film festival in America, the Tasveer South Asian Film Festival in Seattle! Check the trailer below!

The best part about it is, my step-brother, Sam, and my new wife Camille are coming along for the ride :) Follow my social media to catch glimpses of our red-carpet arrival where we’ll be rubbing elbows with some of the elite names in South Asian film such as Shabana Azmi (Deepa Mehta’s Fire) and Suraj Sharma (Ang Lee’s Life of Pi).

And if you’re interested in learning about how I managed to pull off a hybrid live-action/animated short film on a budget with a skeleton crew, fear not! I’m also a panelist on the festival’s short-film workshop where we’ll be pulling the veil back on the grind behind the shine ;)

Thank you, as always, for your love and support, and for listening to my stories wherever they find an outlet.

Peace!

For Flow featured on Blacklist.com's "Go Into the Story" Blog!

March 24, 2015

Almost five years ago to the day, we were on a corner in the Bronx filming For Flow, the short film I adapted from my stage play, that was directed by Jason Camp, and later, was selected as a finalist at the 2011 HBO American Black Film Festival. A lot's happened since then, but I'm always thrilled to see that the film still resonates with folks. This time, Scott Myers of the screenwriter's website BlackList, featured Flow on his blog, Go Into The Story, as a part of "Movies You Made Month" this March. Follow the link or click on the picture below, and check out the whole film for free!

pictured from left: Devere Rogers as "Dee", Vladimi Versailles as "Kane, and Cherrye Davis as "Roxanne"

New York premiere of Dear Brother short!

April 10, 2014 in Film

If you've known me at all for the past four years or so, you have, at one point or another asked me what I'm working on and, if I held your attention long enough, I eventually got to the part where I described a screenplay that I've poured most of my non-acting free time into- mind, body and soul, titled Dear Brother.

For those that are unfamiliar, the logline: An English born Pakistani boxer, Saleem, fights for his freedom after being wrongfully convicted of planning terrorism.

The script tallied a couple wins at competitions/festivals, but it needed some more work to really hit all the notes that a powerful story like this ought to. Well, I've been plugging away at it and luckily, along the way, I met a seasoned and well accomplished screenwriter/Sundance-alum, who believes in the story and has graciously guided me through the most recent round of revisions. Deep breaths...I am thrilled about this rewrite.

SO, what better time than now to screen a 3 minute short film adapted from Dear Brother !? I shot this film in response to a competition that a London-based theatre company named Headlong Theatre organized in honor of the 10th anniversary of the attacks on September 11, 2001. When I found out about the competition, I had exactly three weeks to put the film together. That meant writing it, pre-production (i.e. casting, location scouting, etc.), shooting, and post, condensed into a three-week span, squeezed in between work and other life necessities like food, air and water. Favors were called in and graciously answered (notably, my brothers; Abhijeet for coming up from New Jersey in spite of the flu, to lend his editing expertise, and Samarjeet for remotely scoring the opening music).

In the end, we ended up with this short that you can view on my website OR you can come watch it on the BIG(ger) screen on Saturday, April 19th, when it screens as a part of Katra's monthly film series alongside some stellar films including, one starring Breaking Bad's Bryan Cranston....!? Yes, I'm not burnin BLUE ICE over here. That's the honest to Jah #TROOF. So please come out and watch, support, mingle. Tix available here.

Hope to see you all there! If not, you will probably miss out taking pictures with me like this classic one with the cast of Lily In the Grinder which screened on April 1st. I clearly thought I had to kneel like it was the JV baseball team photo. Go Cougars! (I was next to a flight of stairs OK!?)