Times Music Releases Music Video: We’re All Desi by Delhi 2 Dublin
Delhi 2 Dublin, the international electronic pop bhangra fusion band launched the official music video of ‘We’re All Desi’ from their album of the same name, shot with the local cast and crew in Dharavi slum in Mumbai, the largest slum in Asia. The band had recently visited Mumbai for a music tour and decided to change the way how people portray life in the slums by adding a realistic yet filmy touch to it.
This video is another glowing example of how much untapped talent resides in Dharavi. None of the kids featured in the video are professional actors, rather the director found them playing & hanging around in the Dharavi area during location recce. The story of 5 Bantas (slang for ‘cool dude’) keeping it real in the slums of Dharavi is narrated by Delhi 2 Dublin as Jai, Veeru and the Gabbar gang straight out of the iconic film Sholay. The video features & Durgesh Kunchikorve as “Jai”, Siddhesh Jammi as “Veeru”, Alex Nadar as “Gabbar”, Yogesh Kurme as “Kalia” and David Klyton as “Samba”.
Check out the We’re All Desi music video on the Times Music YouTube channel.
Making of the video “We’re All Desi” by Delhi to Dublin
Director’s Note
Part A- The IDEA
As you guys know, the original idea for the music video was something completely different. The current idea came to me when I was in the flight to Jaipur for the Lit Fest gig. My mind was so full of it that I almost got a headache thinking about the crazy possibilities of doing this.
Part B- The Pitch
I was really nervous when I pitched the idea to Tarun first. I wasn’t really sure if you guys would want to do this. When Tarun said he liked the idea, I got a little confident about this and now really looking forward to doing it. But as he said, it all depends on the team. Well that’s when I was really nervous if everyone would be on-board. I did a little jig when I got a green signal from everyone 🙂
Part C- Yes ! We really have to do this now!
Everyone liked the idea, the pitch was approved, everyone was on board. The first thing I did was called Srusti and told her we are on for the idea! We had massive processes to put together within 15 days. I focused all my energies into the Sula Fest and Bangalore tour first. When I came back, I was so full of the excitement from the gigs, that it took me a while to sink back into the Mumbai vibe.
Finally on 11th Feb, Srusti and me sat together on creating a plan for executing this video. Srusti listed down all the processes we need to follow and made a To-Do list.
Part D- Mission Dharavi
In order to sort permissions and find the correct location to shoot inside Dharavi, we contacted Tony for helping us out. We went for our first reccee to Dharavi and walked around for more than 5 hours to find the correct spots. Though Tony was super helpful and was really trying his level best to show us the location, nothing was really clicking. There were some spots I short-listed, but I wasn’t totally convinced since the setting was not right. Also Tony didn’t have connections with the cops and hence could not help us with the official permissions. Hence I got in touch with another manager of sorts I knew from an earlier shoot. He has a foundation in Dharavi called ‘The Shadow Box Foundation’ and his father has a production house too. I went and met him on another day and did another location reccee with him. That’s when I found all the spots that we have finally used in the music video. Since he has a lot of connections in Dharavi, he helped us get the official permissions to shoot at subsidized rates and also at such a short notice, which is a big deal.
So that is the little story about how we found out spots and obtained official permissions to shoot at one of the busiest areas of Mumbai.
Part E- Casting
When I earlier thought of the script, I had young kids in mind, from the age group of 7-11 years old. Hence Srusti started getting in touch with Casting Directors and started looking at databases of child actors. But none of them were fitting the part. Meanwhile, serendipitously when we went for our location reccee to Dharavi and met Tony, we told him about our script and asked him if he knew of anyone. He then showed us a video of the ‘7 bantas’ (banta is a Mumbai slum slang. It means cool dude). They had a swag which could add another dimension to the video. Hence we met with them and did few acting trails.
It took us two – three days to work with these kids and get them in the character. We first found Veeru played by Siddhesh, then this boy named Yogesh who was going to play the role of Kalia. Then we met with David who was fit for Samba. While walking the streets, we noticed Alex and his natural curly hair were fit for the role of Gabbar. Tony spoke to him and got him on board too. Now we were left with Jai, which was the most difficult to cast. We had a kid named Aditya who tried for the role but we really had to make him practice a lot to get that seriousness out. Finally when he managed to get into the role, he told us four days before the shoot that he has some problems in his house and wont be able to commit 100%. We were stuck and suddenly didn’t have anyone for the lead role. When we met our local manager who was sorting permissions for us, we told him if he knew of anyone. The room which we selected for our interior location shots is also used as a shelter for local kids to get together and practice dance. Over there, we met with this young dancer named Durgesh who was bloody brilliant for the part. We did a few practices with him and got him all ready for the part.
So there, that’s how we had the 5 awesome kids playing our Jai, Veeru, Gabbar, Samba and Kalia. They all have their high school main exams coming up in two weeks, and yet they all took time off and put in their best to make this video look good. Every time we called them for practices and costume trials, they were present.
Apart from all this, Srusti along with help from her family members continuously for 5 straight days from morning to evening made rounds of the different markets in Mumbai to find all the specific props we have used in the video like the plasma ball, teddy bear, bike, cap, bobble heads, etc. In fact, she even got the costumes stitched to give it an authentic 70s era feel with the bell bottom pants, denim jackets etc. Her mom also immensely helped out on this since we didn’t really have the budget for a production assistant.
So that was all that went into the pre-production madness. Bringing us down to 24th February, The Shoot Day-
Our call time was 7 am. One by one the entire crew trickled in and got straight to work. We started with the interiors first. After the entire camera, light and art set-up was done, we started roll at 10.30 am. From that moment on, we didn’t stop until 3 pm for a quick lunch break. One of the most difficult things to handle during shoot was all outdoor shots since at each spot a HUGE crowd would gather and they were really difficult to manage. The kids were super awesome and patient shooting with us during the scorching hours of sunlight, heat, dust and the noise and commotion of huge crowds gathering. We had a total crew of 25 people who really put in crazy amount of hard work and did a splendid job in executing the shoot smoothly.
All of the above has been made possible because of the band’s belief in the idea and the awesome song that they have created. Thank you for all your support and patience on this. This past one month has been awesome working with you all. Thanks once again for trusting me with this and being kind.
In order to sort permissions and find the correct location to shoot inside Dharavi, we contacted Tony for helping us out. We went for our first reccee to Dharavi and walked around for more than 5 hours to find the correct spots. Though Tony was super helpful and was really trying his level best to show us the location, nothing was really clicking. There were some spots I short-listed, but I wasn’t totally convinced since the setting was not right. Also Tony didn’t have connections with the cops and hence could not help us with the official permissions. Hence I got in touch with another manager of sorts I knew from an earlier shoot. He has a foundation in Dharavi called ‘The Shadow Box Foundation’ and his father has a production house too. I went and met him on another day and did another location reccee with him. That’s when I found all the spots that we have finally used in the music video. Since he has a lot of connections in Dharavi, he helped us get the official permissions to shoot at subsidized rates and also at such a short notice, which is a big deal.
So that is the little story about how we found out spots and obtained official permissions to shoot at one of the busiest areas of Mumbai.
Part E- Casting
When I earlier thought of the script, I had young kids in mind, from the age group of 7-11 years old. Hence Srusti started getting in touch with Casting Directors and started looking at databases of child actors. But none of them were fitting the part. Meanwhile, serendipitously when we went for our location reccee to Dharavi and met Tony, we told him about our script and asked him if he knew of anyone. He then showed us a video of the ‘7 bantas’ (banta is a Mumbai slum slang. It means cool dude). They had a swag which could add another dimension to the video. Hence we met with them and did few acting trails.
It took us two – three days to work with these kids and get them in the character. We first found Veeru played by Siddhesh, then this boy named Yogesh who was going to play the role of Kalia. Then we met with David who was fit for Samba. While walking the streets, we noticed Alex and his natural curly hair were fit for the role of Gabbar. Tony spoke to him and got him on board too. Now we were left with Jai, which was the most difficult to cast. We had a kid named Aditya who tried for the role but we really had to make him practice a lot to get that seriousness out. Finally when he managed to get into the role, he told us four days before the shoot that he has some problems in his house and wont be able to commit 100%. We were stuck and suddenly didn’t have anyone for the lead role. When we met our local manager who was sorting permissions for us, we told him if he knew of anyone. The room which we selected for our interior location shots is also used as a shelter for local kids to get together and practice dance. Over there, we met with this young dancer named Durgesh who was bloody brilliant for the part. We did a few practices with him and got him all ready for the part.
So there, that’s how we had the 5 awesome kids playing our Jai, Veeru, Gabbar, Samba and Kalia. They all have their high school main exams coming up in two weeks, and yet they all took time off and put in their best to make this video look good. Every time we called them for practices and costume trials, they were present.
Apart from all this, Srusti along with help from her family members continuously for 5 straight days from morning to evening made rounds of the different markets in Mumbai to find all the specific props we have used in the video like the plasma ball, teddy bear, bike, cap, bobble heads, etc. In fact, she even got the costumes stitched to give it an authentic 70s era feel with the bell bottom pants, denim jackets etc. Her mom also immensely helped out on this since we didn’t really have the budget for a production assistant.
So that was all that went into the pre-production madness. Bringing us down to 24th February, The Shoot Day-
Our call time was 7 am. One by one the entire crew trickled in and got straight to work. We started with the interiors first. After the entire camera, light and art set-up was done, we started roll at 10.30 am. From that moment on, we didn’t stop until 3 pm for a quick lunch break. One of the most difficult things to handle during shoot was all outdoor shots since at each spot a HUGE crowd would gather and they were really difficult to manage. The kids were super awesome and patient shooting with us during the scorching hours of sunlight, heat, dust and the noise and commotion of huge crowds gathering. We had a total crew of 25 people who really put in crazy amount of hard work and did a splendid job in executing the shoot smoothly.
All of the above has been made possible because of the band’s belief in the idea and the awesome song that they have created. Thank you for all your support and patience on this. This past one month has been awesome working with you all. Thanks once again for trusting me with this and being kind.
