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The shoot had just begun, now there was a panther, a steadicam, a jimmy jib and all other basic equipment that is there for a film shoot. Me and Abhishek had tried our level best that we could to ensure that there is no fuck up from the direction team’s side. The schedule had already gone for a toss while we were in Bombay only. Abhishek kept working on it time and again, and guys I mean it literally. We did not know what was in his mind and to get it out is in itself a subject one can make a film on. So we kept following him asking him what scenes we were planning to shoot? After first days shoot, he instructed abhishek to concentrate on making a schedule that needed Amitji. So he just followed what he had asked us to do. The only problem that he faced and which probably got him irritated was the place where we were shooting had no network. This means he cannot get his work done that needed to be taken care of in Mumbai. Even at the location there were one or two such places where he could get a proper network, and given the kind of the use he makes of his cell phone, sheel had to organize and keep new pre paid cards ready every other day.  

We had just catched up with the pace, as he used to come on the sets and decide the shot. By the time he had explained the DOP the shots he wanted to can, he use to go to location number two and design his shots. So while we were shooting the first scene Amit’s assistant had already started to do the lighting. The moment he used to ok the scene we used to move to location two, while RGV used to tell Amit to keep the lighting ready for the third scene. This happened throughout the shoot. At no point did RGV himself or his crew really have any free time. All of us were always on our toes. In fact Amitji had just come out of lilavati hospital and he was still on medication. And his doctors had advised him not to work for more than six hours a day. But the advise was ignored. First day or two he left a bit early. Rest all the days he kept working as long as we all did. His staff Mr. Pravin used to come and take our case saying “sir, yeh aap log kya kar rahe ho? Sahab ko che ghante se jyada kaam nahi karne bola hain doctor. Agar Abhishek sahab ko pata chala na toh hum ko dantenge aur Amitji ko bhi dantenge”. 

The shoot was going on fine. All of a sudden he used to ask Abhishek “where is the schedule?” He used to take a schedule to him and RGV used to glance through it, and tell him “this is not the schedule, make another one. And only scenes which had Amitji”. Abhishek used to keep working on various scenes and show him the schedule two at time three times that RGV just used to glance through and refuse it. Eventually what used to happen was the next days schedule was usually used to be the one which he had made in the beginning. Another interesting that happened was we used to shoot amitji’s portions first. So many a times what use to happen was we used to leave the scene half way after completing Amitji’s dialogues and move t next scene again trying to finish Amitji’s shots. So the other actors portion remained and we ha to shoot them. Now Amitji used to work out at the hotel and usually he used to reach on dot 99.99% of the time at 11:00 Am. Our shift used to start at nine in the morning. Now RGV used to utilize these two hours to can the remaining shots of actors that were left. So the moment Boss use to arrive, we used to ask him, ”which scene ramuji?” he used to look at us say, “you guys don’t have a clue, as to what I am doing”. It was partly true too, as he used to come up with new plans to shoot scenes that he preferred to shoot at that particular time. Though it was not all that bad, I mean as compared to scene number 55 + 56. Still things were absolutely under control. 

When asked many a times we used to ask him “which scene Ramuj?” his answer used to be “that scene, where amitji and revathy are in the room” now he expected us to know which scene he is actually referring to as there were four scene with similar situations between Amitji and Revathy. So depending upon his mood, we used to either directly ask him or if was in the line of fire, I used to send abhi to reassure which scene he was referring to that he wanted to shoot. At times when both Abhi and me didn’t understand as to which scene he was referring to we simply used to send Urvashi to ask him as to which scene he was referring to. In case Urvashi came scratching her head, and then we used to go and ask Amit Roy. He used to answer the way a DOP would answer. And it was “hmmm, zurya I think amitji is coming out from this room, and Revathy is going to enter from this room, and there is supposed o be some conversation happening here, so I am lighting up this area”. All of us used to laugh, but we still were facing the problem as t which scene he was referring to? Now, ab paani naak tak aa gaya. If we go and ask him “which scene Ramuji” hi will say “you guys don’t have a clue”. And we did not want to hear that, as we wanted to be efficient and to know all. So knowing we used to go to Revathyji and ask her “Mam, did he tell you which scene we are shooting?” she once laughed and said “tum log aise kaam karte ho is admi ke saath?”  and we were like “we are used to working with him, he has his way of working and working with him, we have developed a way of working”. It was thrilling, exciting and times scary too. 

One more interesting incidence that kept happening throughout the shoot was, the moment he used to enter the sets, his first line was “show me the scene paper”, aditya our intern was assigned the task of handling the script. So we used to ask him to get the dialogues of the scene we were supposed to shoot. He used to read it and ell us, “tch… this is not the scene” and we were sir, “last night we got the scene, you signed the call sheet too, its the same scene” and he used to be “arrey but, I just changed it this morning no, where is kusum?”, now he is staying in Tea county, we in a hotel called Marthoma. We reach directly to the location, and he has changed the scene this morning. Now how are we supposed to know that??? cut to there are three people calling Kusum at the hotel and someone is seen writing the new dialogues on phone. Knowing that the scenes are changed in the morning, we quickly assigned Urvashi to see to it that she gets us the fresh scene and the dialogues on the sets after checking it with Kusum. Both were sharing the room at Tea county, thank god. Thinking of possible fuck ups that we might face in the remaining days of the shoot. I even told aditya to only carry the copies of scene that we were to shoot that particular day. Every night we used to meet him to get the next days call sheet signed and of course check with kusum, “kal ka scene change hone wala hain kya?”