In the entertainment world, it is said that one success gets you another, one hit song gets you another hit song and one connection leads to another bigger connection. I had only heard of this in the last 10-12 years of my being in the industry, but never experienced it until recently.
This year, my partner Jesse Randhawa and I had represented the Indian dance community at the 66th Cannes film festival. If you could recall, I even wrote a special article on my experience on the red carpet. At the festival we met several people,
and recently, it felt wonderful to get an email inviting us to another prestigious international film festival, as a result of our interaction at the Cannes film festival.
Now, I can believe that one connection leads to another and good work always gets appreciation. The director of the festival, along with a few others, had interacted with Jesse and me at the Cannes film festival, and they loved our body of work and the way we got the Indian audience comfortable with international dance forms. There is a saying in Hindi: ghar ki murgi dal barabar. Be it Freida Pinto or Ujwala Raut, only when they gained popularity and respect on an international level, India and the people in the entertainment world began to respect them. Well, that is the mindset in the world of entertainment, especially Bollywood.
This special email that I received was from St. Tropez International Film Festival, which was being held in the south of France. The email invited us to the festival, which is very popular in the south of France, London and Spain, as special guests. Jesse and I were excited on receiving the invitation and immediately asked our designers to begin work on our apparel for the event.
I carried with me a black suit with a green tie and a pocket square designed by my favourite designer Deepak Shah of More Mischief, and Jesse picked up an Armani dress for herself. We reached the spot and reminisced about the Cannes days. We were warmly welcomed by a team, including Mr Carl Tooney, the festival president. The event was grand and the red carpet was not a wet carpet like the Cannes. It was a grand gala award night with all the famous French and Hollywood stars in attendance. We were surprised to know that we were the only two Indian dancers at the event who were invited. This raised a question in my mind and I spoke to Mr Tooney about the same after walking the prestigious St. Tropez red carpet.
Mr Tooney said, “Sandip, I am so very happy to welcome you and your beautiful wife Jesse to my festival. You both are wonderful and gorgeous people with some amazing work experience. I hope and look forward to welcoming many more stars like you over the forthcoming years as the Festival develops and works to benefit filmmakers from around the world.”
On hearing this, I realised that dancers are like stars in Europe. It is just in India that dancers are treated differently and only a Bollywood actor is considered a star. His words made me realise that we should learn to love our art and not consider artistes any less talented.
There were many Bollywood films that were showcased at the festival: Question Mark, Surkhaab, Arjun, Alison and
many more. In India, they would probably be categorised as “art films” or “low budget” films, but the festival went crazy for them and the way the films were made.
Infact, the award for the best actor was won by an Indian called Akhlaque Khan, for his film Question Mark. Also, the award for the best editing was conferred upon Udhaya Rajni for the same film. But again, the question here is why did this talent go unrecognised in India? I think it is about time we woke up to our own people and encouraged and supported them, giving them the desired platform and applause.
It is unfortunate to see that nowadays, it is more about the money than the real talent. To be on a front page of any well-known and widely read newspaper, one has to pay in lakhs. Even on the television, beauty and money sell more than talent.
There were days when the stage and films only had talented people. Now, there is just beauty and money, and talent has become secondary. I just hope that we soon recognise the worth of our own people and give them the respect and encouragement they deserve.