Silver Linings

This is the story of how I bagged a role in Silver Linings Playbook… and how I almost botched it. And, I’ll introduce you to the secret society that has orchestrated countless acts of good: from a lucky penny scavenger hunt… to replacing lost bicycles... to investing in up-and-coming writers.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Today's stories about Hollywood. I t headaches and the kindness
of strangers. It's also about me your host a pump care,
but mostly it's about making you smile. Welcome to an
pump Cares, Chapter fift, Silver Linings. Back in two thousand eleven,

(00:36):
I was working on a Hindi romcom called Chardin Ki Chandani,
which translates into four Days of Moonlight. At the time,
we were shooting in a tiny village in Rajasthan. The
directors had secured a beautiful old palace for the shoot,
but the location was remote. The closest city was hundred
kilometers away and it was called Jodhpur. But while we

(01:00):
were shooting, I received a note from my lovely agent Route.
In it, she wrote that David or herself was directing
a new film called Silver Linings Playbook and he had
already cast some great actors in it, Robert Nero, Bradley Cooper,
Jennifer Lawrence. She continued, there's a role of an Indian doctor,
a psychiatrist named Dr Purtel, and he would like to
consider you. It's a major role. Ruth explained, I couldn't

(01:25):
believe what I was reading. I can't tell you how
dizzign and beforeake it felt. Then Ruth wrote out the
date and time for a video, called and said to
Land the role, David needs to skype with you. Suddenly
I started to panic, able to Russell wants to skype
with me in this village hundred kilometers away from Jodport.

(01:45):
I don't even know how to skype. I've never skyped
in my life before. I don't even know how it's done.
But it was David Russell, it was Robert de Niro.
So I took a deep breath and called up my
manager Mr Chett in Mumbai. I said, we have to
organize the skype in this village. I said, yes, sir,

(02:05):
care sir, what are you talking. You're in a village.
There is a connectivity problem there. The problem is there
is no connectivity. We can't do it. But knowing the
opportunity in front of me, I refused to accept his explanation.
Actors do skype casting calls all the time. How hard
it could be, I insisted we have to. This is

(02:28):
the most important role of my career. And I was determined.
After all, my hero, the god of acting himself, Robert Nero,
was going to be in this film. I had a
chance to join a dreamcast. We have to make this work.
In the next twenty four hours, news of the skype

(02:48):
call spread through the village and it took on the
tone of epic folklore. The skype is coming, The Skype
is coming, I would hear people whisper. Finally we got
some sort of internet connection from joh Pool and a
laptop was bought specially for the purpose. On the schedule,

(03:08):
time and date, early morning in Los Angeles and late
evening there David or Russell called. I sat with the
script on one side of the laptop behind me. Sat
half the village in pin drop silence. As they had
been instructed. They watched and waited because the skype was coming,

(03:32):
and now it was here. I saw David on my monitor.
This was it. I smiled and started Hello Mr David,
I mean hello David, Hello, Mr Russell, Hello, sir, Hello
hello Hello. There was no sound. You could see my
face and I could see his, but the audio refused

(03:55):
to cooperate. My heart sank I frantically mind for him
to hold on. One moment, as I looked around desperately
for someone to help, David was clearly irritated in his mind.
He had given me enough time to figure out the technology.
His office had confirmed that I was prepared. Ruth had
also double checked to make sure we were good. But

(04:18):
as my manager Mr. Satt had put it, there was
a connectivity problem in the village. There was no connectivity.
Before he signed off, David wrote something on a piece
of paper and held it up for me to see.
Next time, be more prepared. The note hurt. Ruth was

(04:42):
upset too, She said, you should have been more prepared
on open. I was crushed, but I was not finished.
A few days later, I rushed to Canada attend a
film premiere at the Toronto Film Festival. Somehow Ruth secured

(05:04):
another call with David, and I managed to fix the
meeting for a time. When I knew I would be
in my hotel room. This wasn't a tiny remote village,
this was a four seasons hotel with the stable internet connection.
Everything was feeling good. I had the hotel technician set
up my laptop. Then I propped up the script against it.

(05:25):
I had memorized my lines, but just in case I
got just then, I assured myself nothing could go wrong
this time. I assured Ruth too. The hotel had staffed
my room with an attendant, smart young man from Bangladesh
named Jamille. He was overjoyed to see me and couldn't
believe that, of all the rooms in the hotel, he

(05:47):
was assigned to mine. The first thing he said to me,
that means elder brother in Bengali. I'm a big fan
of yours. I was his Robert de Niro. He told
me his cousin was also a huge fan of mine.
So I offered to talk to him on his phone,
and then to his aunt, Hello, how are you? Yes,

(06:08):
hello Auntie, I'm fine, very good, very good, Oh Kara,
And then his uncle, Hello, uncle, Oh you want me
to speak a dialogue from a film? Okay? Until I
had spoken to almost every member of his family back
in Bangladesh, that's enough. He was making tea for us

(06:31):
when suddenly the call came. It was time. I rushed
to the other room and accepted the call. The skype
session started and David Russell was there, and I was there.
But how do you it was not there? No, how
could this be happening again? Are you sure you weren't

(06:52):
on mute? This time? David was even more upset, he
hung up the line with a bank. I couldn't believe it. Yes,
a bad connection could happen in a remote village of Rajasthan,
but this was Toronto, the four season hotel. Then Ruth called,
what's wrong with you? And how could you let this
happen again? I explained that I had prepared this time,

(07:14):
but she was upset, and like me, she was frustrated.
She told me she would call David one last time
to see if there was anything we could do to
salvage my chances of being in the film. After what
felt like an eternity, Ruth called me back. He says,
to send a clip of your audition to the casting directors.

(07:36):
I couldn't believe my luck occurred chance. Then Ruth turns
turn and opum, you need to send the video by
tomorrow evening at any cost. When I emerged from the
room dejected, Jamiel asked me, Dad, what happened? That we
Indians have a habit of telling our problems to everybody,

(07:59):
So I sat. He shared his tea. I shared my fears, Jamila,
I have a problem. I was going to get a
role in a big Hollywood film, but there was a
problem with the Skype. The audio didn't work twice. Now
I have to send them a video clip and I
don't know how to send it. I don't even have

(08:19):
a way to record it. But Jamiale wasn't faced. He
said that I have an iPhone. I can record the
clip for you and send you the link. You can
forward that. Ah. Really, I asked, in great excitement, will
that work? Will you do it? He said yes, that
it would work anything for you. That In an instant,

(08:43):
my room attendant, Jamille became my director, my cameraman. Suddenly
my spirits had risen. Jamille. When I make a gesture
with my hand to start use the action, and when
I make another gesture, a different gesture, you say cut.
Are you ready, Jamil, I'm ready. Clearly Jamiale was a
saded for the role. And Jammie, don't cheat the camera,
I said, just stay where you are. I will come

(09:04):
closer and go back. You just stay there and keep
the camera stable, he said, grinning white. When I moved
my hand, he said action dada. When I made another gesture,
he said dada. Within half hour, Jamale had shortcut and
sent over my audition link, which I then forwarded to

(09:25):
David's casting the ritor Lindsay. That evening, Lindsay called to
say she had received the clip, and by the way,
on what is the dada thing being said? At the
beginning and the end of the clip? Oh Dada? I
told her all about Jemmie, the up and coming director

(09:47):
working at the Four Seasons who might one day give
David a run for his money. Lending the role of
to to Pertail in solo linings playbook changed my life,
and honestly, I don't know what I would have done
without Jamale. It's a beautiful thing that you can meet

(10:10):
someone once, just for a fleeting moment, a blink in
the grand scheme of lifetime, and they can have such
a deep impact on your story. I hope that I
have been that kind stranger to others, that my little
acts of generosity have touched others lives in the same
way Jamille touched mine. Thank you, Jamil. Speaking of kindness,

(10:40):
I want to tell you about Courtney Martin and the
quiet way she has worked to put a little goodness
into this world. Sometime around two Courtney landed a major
book deal. In fact, the publisher wanted to give her
a six figure advance for her upcoming novel, a book
called Perfect Girls Starving Daughters. It was an incredible windfall,

(11:04):
and while Courtney deserved every penny of it, well, she
felt a little guilty about it. She had never had
so much money at her disposal before. She donated a
portion to traditional charities, but she wasn't satisfied. She wanted
to do more. Then, Courtney had an idea. Giving to

(11:29):
charity she realized can certainly make you feel good, but
there's also something impersonal about it. You can send money
over the internet or through a text message. Maybe in
return you will get a thank you note, but chances
are you will never see how you have helped people.
Courtney wanted to cut out the middleman and see firsthand

(11:52):
how our money could brighten a person's day in new
and original ways. So she gathered some friends, handed them
each hundred dollars and presented them with the challenge. They
had to find the most imaginative ways to give that
money away. The sky was the limit, she said, but

(12:12):
there was just one catch. They would all be held accountable.
A few months later, the group would reconvene to explain
how they donated the money. Courtney called the group the
Secret Society for Creative Philanthropy. The resulting ideas were just
well listen to them. Courtney's mother broke her hundred into

(12:36):
four hundred quarters and scattered them around an elementary school playground.
When the bell struck for recess, one of the happiest
and the most spontaneous scavenger hunts ensued as kids delightedly
discovered the money. Another participant took things a step further
when she broke her hander down into ten thousand pennies

(12:57):
and shipped them to friends all across America with instructions
to place them heads up on sidewalks around their home cities.
Within days, thousands of people began stumbling upon lucky pennies.
Another participant, rather than break the hundred into change, did
the opposite and deposited the money into high interest bank

(13:18):
account that, over the next hundred years, with the help
of compounding interests, could be worth millions. In the instructions,
the philanthropists wrote to his future granddaughter, asking her to
give it all away to those in need. One participant
used his money to buy umbrellas, then when it rained,

(13:41):
he stood on a corner and handed them out to
people getting soaked. Of course, not everyone wanted the charity.
When one rain stoked man asked him what did the catch,
the philanthropists replied, no catch, take an umbrella, you're getting
wet instead. The man refused and went back to walking
in the rain. Most experiments, though, succeeded at spreading some

(14:04):
unexpected joy. One participant offered commuters one dollar as long
as the travelers promised to start a conversation with a
complete stranger. The conversations were recorded and ended up being
utterly wacky and wonderful, as strangers discussed everything from fireworks
to Marlon Brando to bananas slugs. One participant gave the

(14:28):
money away lump summer. One used it to buy chocolates
and boxed pasta for college students doing charity work in
Latin America and Africa. Another man used it to fix
a broken bicycle he found on the street. Then he
gave the bike away to a person whose bike had
been recently stolen. And another woman, the founder of a
website for aspiring women writers, gave the hundred dollars to

(14:50):
the site's most devoted commented. To her surprise, the recipient
was a corrections officer with the dream of becoming an author.
The experiments to say the Least were a huge success. Originally,
the Secret Society for Creative Philanthropy included just nine participants,
but over time new chapters evolved and grew, with dozens

(15:13):
upon dozens more heartwarming projects emerging. If anything, Courtney's stories
proof that you don't need much to make a perfect
stranger feel like a hundred bucks. That's it for today's episode.

(15:36):
I'm an Open Care, Be kind to yourself, and thank
you for listening. Opum Cares is a production of I

(15:56):
Heart Read, I'm Your Host An Open Care. Our executive
producer is Senior producer Julian Weller, Associate producer Morgan Lavoy.
Sound design and mixing by Julian Weller and Dan Pauza.
Music by Aaron Kaufman. Production support from Emily Maronov and

(16:19):
Married You. Writing by Lucas Riley, Matt Riddle, Margon Lavoy
and Julian Weller. Lucas Riley and Matt Riddle are our
story editors. Thanks to Sikin Paru Hermandy Suza, bardwy Amana,
Sidium Studios, Donald Burn and pop It Hello, Hello, Hello,

(16:49):
I'm fine, I'm fine. Thank you. Oh, you want me
to speak a dialogue from a film. Okay, I don't
remember that. Uh No,