Post by admin on Aug 24, 2007 18:51:34 GMT 8
He walks in for the interview fifteen minutes late, but Krishnan more than makes up for lost time by talking at “90 miles a minute,” something he says he always does.
He orders a fresh lime soda, but every time he picks up his glass, something else occurs to him and he puts it back down again, and resumes talking about his various entertaining and serendipitous brushes with fame.Krishnan, a 26-year-old film student at the University of South California, is a jack of all trades. He studied biochemistry and modern technology at Harvard among other things (“I changed my major five times.”) in his quest to find a way to make a difference to the world.
But he was always more inclined towards the arts - he plays the violin and knows Bharatanatayam and Kuchipuddi - and applied for social service and art fellowships that would bring him to India (he’s lived in the US all his life).
He directed a musical play for underprivileged children in Mumbai, and was even invited to the Rashtrapati Bhavan to meet former President Abdul Kalam.
His meeting with Christina Aguilera was under very different circumstances. He got a call from a friend who told him that there were auditions being held for Indian dancers.
Once there, he was told to dance. “When I asked them what steps they wanted me to do, they said I could do anything; when I asked them for music, they said they hadn’t got any ready yet. So I did a whole bunch of stuff - Bharatanatayam, Dhaniya, Bhangra,” he says.
Two weeks later he was called back and met with the director. It turned out to be Tarsem Singh, who directed the Jennifer Lopez-starrer The Cell. “I found out that I was going to be in a soft drink commercial.
Then I looked around and saw Christina Aguilera walking by with her entourage - she had three bodyguards, one person to manage her dog and one to carry her high heels! In the ad, she was going around the world and would be dancing with different toy boys and I was going to be her Indian toyboy,” he says.
With Mira Nair, things were different. Krishnan wrote to her, saying that he was a big fan of her work and asked if he could observe her on the sets of The Namesake.
She replied and said yes,” he says, “so I went to the sets and just watched her at work. One day, I was told that I had the same skin colour as the lead actor and because of that, I was going to be his photo double.”
He was the photo double for Kal Penn? “No! For Irrfan Khan!” he laughs. “So I had to wear a curly wig and wherever you see close-ups of Irrfan’s hand and the back of his head, that’s me,” he says.
So with this first-hand experience of making a feature film, when will he make his own? “I have to do a film for my thesis next year. I plan on shooting it in India and expanding it into a feature later on,” he says.
He also has plans of coming back to Bangalore and working on a lot of collaborations here. “This city has a great energy and people are ready to try new things. So I’m coming back here as soon as I can!”
Source: Times Of India
He orders a fresh lime soda, but every time he picks up his glass, something else occurs to him and he puts it back down again, and resumes talking about his various entertaining and serendipitous brushes with fame.Krishnan, a 26-year-old film student at the University of South California, is a jack of all trades. He studied biochemistry and modern technology at Harvard among other things (“I changed my major five times.”) in his quest to find a way to make a difference to the world.
But he was always more inclined towards the arts - he plays the violin and knows Bharatanatayam and Kuchipuddi - and applied for social service and art fellowships that would bring him to India (he’s lived in the US all his life).
He directed a musical play for underprivileged children in Mumbai, and was even invited to the Rashtrapati Bhavan to meet former President Abdul Kalam.
His meeting with Christina Aguilera was under very different circumstances. He got a call from a friend who told him that there were auditions being held for Indian dancers.
Once there, he was told to dance. “When I asked them what steps they wanted me to do, they said I could do anything; when I asked them for music, they said they hadn’t got any ready yet. So I did a whole bunch of stuff - Bharatanatayam, Dhaniya, Bhangra,” he says.
Two weeks later he was called back and met with the director. It turned out to be Tarsem Singh, who directed the Jennifer Lopez-starrer The Cell. “I found out that I was going to be in a soft drink commercial.
Then I looked around and saw Christina Aguilera walking by with her entourage - she had three bodyguards, one person to manage her dog and one to carry her high heels! In the ad, she was going around the world and would be dancing with different toy boys and I was going to be her Indian toyboy,” he says.
With Mira Nair, things were different. Krishnan wrote to her, saying that he was a big fan of her work and asked if he could observe her on the sets of The Namesake.
She replied and said yes,” he says, “so I went to the sets and just watched her at work. One day, I was told that I had the same skin colour as the lead actor and because of that, I was going to be his photo double.”
He was the photo double for Kal Penn? “No! For Irrfan Khan!” he laughs. “So I had to wear a curly wig and wherever you see close-ups of Irrfan’s hand and the back of his head, that’s me,” he says.
So with this first-hand experience of making a feature film, when will he make his own? “I have to do a film for my thesis next year. I plan on shooting it in India and expanding it into a feature later on,” he says.
He also has plans of coming back to Bangalore and working on a lot of collaborations here. “This city has a great energy and people are ready to try new things. So I’m coming back here as soon as I can!”
Source: Times Of India