Hardik Mehta is a filmmaker. He’s known for the documentary Amdavad Ma Famous, which won him the National Award, and the recently released Kaamyaab, a cinematic homage to the Hindi film industry’s “side actors”. He also co-wrote the web series Paatal Lok, which is currently playing and earning rave reviews.

Hardik sits down with Abhinandan Sekhri to talk about how he came upon the idea of making a film on the supporting actors who had iconic presence in the 1980s and 1990s but then slipped into oblivion. Hardik also talks about the struggle of finally getting a theatrical release for Kaamyaab, just a week before the coronavirus pandemic forced cinemas to shut down.

On releasing a film right before the lockdown, Hardik says for a small film like his, it needs to survive a week for the word to get around before people start coming in, and that didn’t happen. On the brighter side, he adds, “The lockdown ensured that everybody was home and now that everybody was at home, everybody watched Kaamyaab.”

They also talk about Hardik’s career shift from being a dairy technologist at Amul to filmmaker, his journey to Mumbai to follow his dream, his struggles in the city, and his co-writing Paatal Lok.

Watch.