Chhoti Aakhein Bade Sapne

i was six years old when i watched this

film

and every time i heard shahrukh khan say

anjali

i thought he’s calling out to me

literally

i just knew that this is the place where

i belong

little did i realize that at a very

young and innocent age

i had found my true calling in life

acting

i dreamt of being an actor at the age of

6 and i broke it to my parents

when i was 21 so let me introduce myself

my name is anjali bharat and i am an

actor

i come from a simple middle class

gujarati family

where my father works in a bank my

mother is a wonderful house maker

and my younger sister who works in an

agency

i was born and brought up in navi mumbai

and yes

i still get responses like do you need a

visa to travel to mumbai

do we need to book you an outstation cab

with that said please fasten your seat

belts

as we will now travel back in time

to when my dream was well just a dream

and as my social media bio aptly

summarizes

i was six when i wanted to act and i

kept this as my safely guarded secret

for 15 long years 15 years

of holding on to a secret true story

i can’t even plan birthday surprises

because i just have to blurt it out

i intentionally decided not to disclose

this with

anyone because i was petrified that i

would be judged

and laughed at for my choices as i grew

older the fire in me to pursue my dreams

got bigger and bigger when you come from

a completely non-filmy background and

have no connections whatsoever

you really don’t know who to speak to

how to begin

or just what to do so

i started calculating backwards i asked

myself

what do i need to do to become an actor

at that time i would often read in

newspapers that some actor was spotted

in a production house

and then his life changed overnight

instantly

i had a plan right in front of me

i made up my mind that i am going to

work in a production

house and for that i needed my degree in

mass media

and that’s exactly what i transpired i

thought

i had figured it all out like a perfect

mathematical equation

i was young knife ambitious deadly combo

so as per the plan i finished my

bachelors in mass media

and slid into the spam mails of all the

good production houses

with a hope to get an opportunity to

intern

i was willing to work for free however i

got

nothing substantial for nine full months

so on one side where my friends were

either pursuing their masters

or some had even started earning i had

nothing concrete in my hands

i thought maybe now’s the time to work

on myself

and take up a small acting course

at the age of 21 i gathered all the

courage in the world

and i went up to my parents and i told

them

that since i don’t really have anything

much right now

i was wondering if i could take up a

three-month acting course in andheri

west

dramatic pause sorry guys no soft story

here because my parents were completely

on board

and they told me to go ahead with it but

that

was just one part the next question was

what’s the face the cost of that course

was rupees 90 000

in 2013. you would know how much that

amount means

to a middle class family luckily

there was an option to pay an

installment so my father paid 30 000

rupees every month

and i paid in guilt

my class would start at 9am in andheri

west

and since i stayed in navi mumbai i

would leave my house at 5 45 am

change two trains and reach andheri

station by 8 am

with no metro and an endless wait for

the bus i decided to take an auto ride

on my first day of class

the cost of that autoride was 60 rupees

one day

that’s 120 in a day 3600 in a month

and 10 500 rupees in three months

i was always good at maths so

i had a plan once again i decided i am

going to save this 10

hundred rupees and use it for the last

installment of my fees and help my

father

hence i started walking six kilometers

every day from aderi station to my

classes

daily workout check one fine day

a casting director named weber vishal

who then worked with mukesh shabra

casting company

gave us a guest lecture and shared his

email id with us

for any future help guess who wrote to

him

instantly my email screamed enthusiasm

and eagerness to audition and to my

surprise

he called me to audition for a film in

mukesh chandra casting company

i was thrilled in my head i had already

made it i was in a big banner film and

already giving my ted talk in 2013

but that audition was my first reality

check

and let me put it in this perspective

since we have a lot of non-actors here

auditions are to us what ai tripoli is

for you guys

but with 99.9 percent cut off

because literally that many people

audition for that part

and one person gets the job

coming back to my audition it was

horrible

because i got so overwhelmed with the

entire process

that i ended up acting you know what i

mean

acting is basically being able to not

act at

all and my audition was terrible

i could see it in his face i was so

disappointed with myself that i had lost

such a good opportunity

i went back to my same routine i

finished my acting course

but in this entire process my confidence

had taken a hit

i did not have courage to give auditions

anymore

but i hadn’t given up on acting

so i started looking out for a job in

production house once again

but this time to understand the process

of content

and get comfortable in that environment

i finally secured a full-time job in an

ad production house

in 2015 as a director’s assistant

i was then promoted to being an

associate producer in 2015 i was doing

decent for my age

i was taking care of my expenses and i

was proud about that

however there was this one emotion that

kept

haunting me every time i was on set

why am i standing behind the camera when

i know i belong in the front

it used to frustrate me to watch someone

else perform

but i never expressed this even in the

production house i was working with

because i thought i would be judged

again

then came my first breakthrough dubsmash

you remember that app where you could

act out movie dialogues

yeah i know some of you are already

judging me right now but don’t worry

it’s completely okay people laughed at

me then

for making those videos people laugh at

me now when they hear the story

and people can laugh at me all they want

but you know what i went to that app

seeking an outlet and came off gaining

my confidence back

my videos were being shared my followers

were increasing

and more than that i was upskilling

tubsmash served as a fodder to my

acting bug and what drove me even more

was that people were enjoying watching

me perform

one of my college seniors happened to

watch my dub

and called me for an audition that he

was working on

i was thrilled and nervous at the same

time

because now i was going to audition

after one and a half years post my

initial hiccup

but you know what i just got the part

and just like that my fear of auditions

had also

vanished i was so elated that i was

finally going to face the camera as a

professional

actor you know there are some moments

in your life in which you have an

out-of-body experience that you just

can’t put it in words

that moment for me was when i heard

action

i knew this is what i wanted to hear for

the rest of my life

post that ad i continued doing my work

and auditions only to realize that i

couldn’t sail on two boats

in 2015 i went to my parents and i told

them

that i want to quit my job and pursue

acting full-time

my parents obviously had their own

concerns and they asked me if i was

willing to let go

of the cushion and security of a monthly

income

and instead keep waiting for an acting

gig to materialize

i told them that i had saved some money

which could sustain for one year tops

and in that one year i wanted to give

500

to acting and see if i could pull it off

and to my surprise they said yes go

ahead

then began the vicious circle of

auditions reaching out to casting

directors

and my best friend rejections

i used to audition for about 60 ads in a

month

out of which i would get shortlisted for

say about 20

and then maybe i would get that one ad

in that way i managed to get two ads in

six months

but i took it as a silver lining

meanwhile my parents had also figured

that she is not going to give up on

acting

and in fact they even celebrated my

tiniest of wins

i remember my mother cried more than me

when one of the tvcs i had shot for

chopped my two seconds of visuals and

she just couldn’t understand why

but i kept going

slowly i started getting ads short films

and then came my second breakthrough

digital media

in 2018 sorry in 2018 i got my first

digital sketch and people started loving

and recognizing me from those videos

i was elated that people wanted to watch

me for more than just 30 seconds

i went on to work with the best of

digital channels like scoopful

filter copy blush rv cj and so on

soon i became the digital face digital

truly gave me wings to fly i would play

multiple characters

every other day and it gave me a

platform to showcase my talent to a

wider

audience interestingly in the same year

in 2018 i got a call from mukesh chhabra

casting company

saying that they would want to audition

me for a film

a big banner finn from a production

house i used to once

obsess about and i was bundle of nerves

all over again i gathered all the

courage

and went for that audition and turns out

i

actually did well as an actor

you just know when you’ve given that

good take after a few days i got a call

saying that i was shortlisted for the

film

and i was anxious and how but

i did not follow up with the casting

director because i have this weird

fear that i will jinx a project if i do

so

so even though i didn’t ask about it i

never forgot about it either

cut 2 few months later i get a call

from the same team saying um anjali we

would like to audition you for a web

show called scam 1992

without inquiring about the previous

project i went to the office

to test for this part belvinder singh

one of the senior most casting directors

in mukesh shabra casting company

came to me and he told me anjali i just

wanted to tell you that we had

loved your audition for the film and i

won’t be able to forget that

for a really long time but i’m sorry

that it didn’t work out and i’m sure

something good is going to come out of

this

that moment brought me closure to the

much brought me closure and much needed

calm to the chaos

in my head that day i

also learned that rejections hurt you a

little more

when they come wrapped in the form of a

genuine compliment

with a smile on my face and tears in my

eyes

i just said thank you and went to the

studio to audition for jyoti mehta scam

1992

and wait it’s not over yet i got to know

that i was shortlisted for that part

and then the project went on hold for

one year

there wasn’t one single day when i

didn’t think about it or didn’t hope for

it to materialize

i kept doing my regular acting work and

one year later i get a call from the

same team

asking anjali do you remember the part

that you had tested for

in scam 1992 we just wanted to uh check

your

dates and confirm your availability

do i even need to say how i felt

i just screamed a big yes

from giving the worst audition of my

life in 2013

to winning a dream project in 2019

from the same company life had come

a full circle

from my humble beginnings and a roller

coaster ride

i have learned a few lessons which i

would love to share

number one there is no plan b

but root bee if you really want to chase

your dreams and if you have an

undying passion towards it never give

yourself a cushion

of plan b because when you do that you

end up

accessing that plan b instead give

yourself a root b

root c root d or a root z because

there might be many rules that will

reach to your destination

but no root is an easy one

second success is a commodity

oprah winfrey before becoming the oprah

winfrey

was told that she is unfit for

television sachin denulker got out at 15

runs in his debut match against pakistan

so you can’t just get up one fine day

and expect success right away

even if you’re the best at something it

just

doesn’t work like that so when i say

success is a commodity

it is i mean that if you want it you

earn it third

my best friend rejections

who hasn’t faced and overcome rejections

every rejection in your life has brought

you to this point

and trust me if you can look back at

those rejections

with a smile and without any better

feelings

you will do just fine so if there are a

hundred people who may reject you

you need to be that one person who

believes in you

today when scam 1992 has technically

broken

all the records and people ask me how

does it feel to achieve this overnight

success

five years of undeterred hard work

and a million of rejections flash in

front of my eyes

and i just tell them i feel content

do i feel i have arrived no do i have

producers and directors waiting for me

at the doorstep

no do i know what i’m going to do next

not really

but i know one thing for sure that you

are only you’re as good

as your last project so right now

while the audiences are loving the show

and the critics are appreciating my

performance

i am back to auditioning i am still

winning some jobs and i’m still

losing a lot of jobs but

i sleep happy at night that i’ve made

the six-year-old anjali

proud from obsessing over one production

house

to falling in love with my craft from

anjali to risk head over scare this

has been my journey so far

picture aviva meridos until then

stay positive and test negative thank

you so much