BollywoodGora

Pretty real. Particularly for girls. Girls would really, really struggle with this, apparently even the famous Indian ones, but certainly the white ones. Continually get taken out to dinner by a 'producer' who wanted to talk about a role for a film; and the dinner would be in the Marriot or somewhere where he'd already taken a room upstairs. As far as I could tell the only real way around it for girls was to make do with small roles or get hitched with someone quite famous.

For guys, I didn't deal with much except when I did any modelling. I mean, except for people getting handsy on-set, which was kinda common (I was touched up two, maybe three times). But in modelling it's explicit as fuck.

Story time: I was on set for a film, and a really famous fashion designer was there because he was friends with the director or someone. He's there, just checking things out and drinking chai and stuff. Anyway, he starts talking to me about whether I want to do modelling and I said "I suck at it, but a ramp show does seem like a lot of fun", so he takes my name and connects with me on FB. That night, he starts sending some pretty crazy explicit messages, basically saying "If you don't fuck me/suck me off, you ain't getting any work" (just with him, not threatening to ruin my career I should add). I mentioned it to an Iranian guy the next day on another set for another thing, he was a model, and he unloaded. Said his agent was about to send him back to Iran because he wouldn't 'play ball' and as a result wasn't getting any ramp work. Said it was pretty much the understood thing that if you wanted to get ramp shows and serious modelling work, you pretty much had to bend over for it; then recounted about seven or eight really dodgy incidents which were kinda rapey as fuck.

Yeah they take it deadly seriously.

But they know they're over-the-top. You've got to recognise that a serious segment of their audience is living in abject poverty, they're 'gaonwale' or village people. They don't want their reality reflected the way we in the west do, because their reality is dull.

The term they often use to describe it was "escapism" and I think that nails it pretty much. They want it to be over the top and silly - they get out of their seats and shout insults when the villain appears on-screen.

Also, go back to our films of the 60's and 70's and you'll see a similar vibe. Over-the-top colours, bizarre costumes, obviously-fake sets, laborious unrealistic dialogues - that's the era Bollywood is in now. Well, was - it'd already started changing by 2010 when I left, and gritty(er) films were becoming more common.

Problem is, as an actor you could 'out' someone - but that'd be the end of your career.

I remember Abhishek Bachchan was a bit of a kid, on the set of a film called Dostana he threw water bottles and would hide from people and stuff like that; but no seriously good pranks.

Except the stunts. The stunts were almost always like "Hey we're going to put your life at risk" and if you got cranky later at the level or risk, the response tended to be "But everything turned out okay didn't it?" which often felt like the Bollywood version of "It's a prank brah"

Well I was hurt quite badly in a stunt in this film, 'Luck' at 2.56.

We had to run across train tracks for some sadistic betting ring, me and a bunch of other people and Sanjay Dutt. Each of us get nailed by the trains - except him. I'm first to shoot the getting hit by a train bit, and they do it by pulling a diesel locomotive up to next to me, putting me in a harness and attaching it to a pulley system and pneumatic arm. The pneumatic arm is charged up with pressurised air, and then released, and I'm yanked off my feet into the air - as if pinged off the train as it hits me.

Well what they hadn't figured was that as I was yanked up and left, my legs would flick right. Smashed my ankle into that giant push-plate thing on the end of the train. Broke off a bit of bone. I am screaming, dangling in the air, and the stunt directors crew come over to grab me and stop me swinging - by my busted ankle. Jesus it hurt.

What did they say? Didn't say shit. Didn't even say sorry. Just kept complaining that as we had to re-shoot the jumping out of the truck bit, my ankle hurt too much and was too swollen for me to jump off a truck onto uneven railway stones. I disliked that stunt director. That was the second time he risked my safety.

Edit: FUCKERS DIDN'T EVEN USE THAT SHOT! I'd not seen the scene until just now.