Bootstrapping a Community Wildfire Response/Sandeep Parikh - Altadena, Crowdfund, EffinFunny ~ Spark of Ages Ep 36 - Spark of Ages

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Welcome to the Spark of Ages podcast.
Today we're hanging out with myco-host and brother, sandeep
Parikh, and I get to talk abouthim because he has so much to
share.
Sandeep is a true renaissanceman of the digital age.
They in LA or in Hollywood callit a multi-hyphenate who's
blazed his own trail as adirector, actor and digital

(00:26):
showrunner in comedy, gaming andinteractive entertainment.
Sundeep's worked with a lot ofnames.
You know Comedy Central, sony,fx, nickelodeon, tbs, hasbro.
You may recognize him from hisbreakout role as Zabu in the
Guild as I have.
I've walked down the road withhim and people recognize him

(00:49):
which started as an internetseries and ended up being bought
by geek and sundry and ran forsix seasons.
Right now he's starring in desiquest, a dungeon and dungeons
and dragons series making wavesin the ttrpg world, which is
tabletop role-playing game worldthat's about to hit Hasbro's
official D&D channel this spring, and recently he just teamed up

(01:12):
with Rekha Shankar to raisecrowdsourced capital via
Kickstarter for his next movie,vidya's Guide for the Afterlife.
Behind the camera, sandeep hasdirected numerous web series of
his own called Legend of Neil,which is based on the video game
Zelda, wrote for the animatedNetflix series Glitch Tech and
has directed commercials forbrands like Walmart and
countless Silicon Valleystartups.

(01:33):
Besides being the co-host ofthis podcast, sanip is also the
co-host of your Mom is, aPodcast with Malana Weintraub,
who's also been on the show, aswell as the show ABCD, american
Born Chatty.
This Is podcast, so go checkout those after you listen to
the show.
So Sundeep attended BrownUniversity, where he has a

(01:53):
degree in computer science andtheater.
So, sundeep, welcome back tothe show, because I know you've
been away for some time.
We've really missed you.
My triumphant return.
We, as in me and your producer,anand, have really missed you,
as well as the audience.
A lot of times they're likewhere's that guy who makes all
this stuff real, um, and where'sthat guy that sounds a lot like

(02:15):
you?
Yeah, your voice double,apparently.
Apparently we're that closesometimes our parents can't tell
us apart.
I mean, yeah, they always saysometimes they're like I'm on
the phone with them for like 10minutes and they'll be like well
, rajiv, I'm like you know,you've been talking to not rajiv
for a while, right, and they'relike huh, why are you talking

(02:37):
to me about something completelydifferent?
Yeah, it's just that rajiv isso multi-textured and of course
I get.
I get called Sanjeev, I getcalled my son's name, Arjun, so
I get called all kinds of thingsfrom our parents.
It's this affection that theyhave for everybody.
So one of the things I thinkthat's going to be interesting
to talk about today is that thereason why you've been away for

(02:59):
quite some time, you've gonethrough this incredible,
difficult for many and mostheartbreaking experience and
maybe a point of resilienceexperience called the LA Fires.
So you are, I guess would youcall, would I call you a climate
resilience, survivor, I suppose.

(03:22):
So that sounds very fancy forhow I feel, but you know you
said a lot of fancy things inthe bio, so I guess I'll chalk
that up as well.
Experience, uh, since becominga father and you know, as sort

(03:44):
of um, you know, a co-leader ofour family, uh, and uh, it's
yeah.
So we were displaced from the,the la wildfires, the we lived
in altadena, um, and we're over9 000 structures, were there's
no better word than decimatedand has laid waste to what was

(04:05):
once a beautiful, gorgeousneighborhood where we raised our
son for all five years of hislife, and there's no way of
sugarcoating it.
It was super challenging.
Our house still stands.
It was super challenging.

(04:27):
Our house still stands, however, it is sort of infiltrated or
has been sort of succumbed tomassive smoke damage and ash and
char and soot, and that we'refinding out more and more in the
research that it's highly toxic, filled with lead and asbestos,
cyanide, a whole bunch of otherreally damaging neurotoxins.

(04:48):
So it's unclear as to whetheror not our house will be safe to
return to anytime soon.
Every week is a new wildchallenge that either involves a
shouting match with insuranceor discovering some new
neurotoxin, or trying to figureout where, um a kid's going to
go to school and it's.
It's been um, an absolute uhwild ride and has certainly

(05:11):
tested our resilience as afamily.
Yeah, tested me in in, in, uh,in all the ways that I can name,
you know, as an artist, as afather, as a husband, as a yeah,
so it's been.
It's been super, superchallenging, but you know, I am
heartened by the level of like,outpouring of real support from,

(05:36):
of course, family and friends,but even strangers that have
sort of stepped up and tried tohelp in the many ways they can.
I'm also a part of I guess I'llmention this that I'm working
with an advocacy group that Ihelped name, using my creative
brain.
Well, you're a creator andyou're a leader and an organizer

(05:58):
, right?
You started your own business.
All your life You've been anentrepreneur, and so those
skills serve you well.
When you're in this situation,there's this like element of uh,
I think that I don't know, it'sprobably some combination of
you and mom and dad and and allthese influences in my life.
Really, sort of when I, when I,when I feel like I'm faced with

(06:22):
a challenge like this, I can'thelp but somehow find a way to
step up.
I feel like there's always avacuum in these times of
challenge, where people arelooking for leadership, they're
looking for answers, and so whenI feel like I am in it, in the
mix of it, and I start findingvarious answers to things, I

(06:42):
feel compelled to want to sharethose answers.
And then, before I know it, I'ma part of an organization that
is dedicated to that and tryingto just utilize all my skills.
So the organization is calledthe Eaton Fire Residents United,
efru, and you can find it atEFRULA, and the sole real

(07:02):
mission of that organization isto map.
Essentially, we're creating adynamic map that is taking all
of the industrial hygienisttesting that's being done on
homes that are still standing,have uh, or or insurance is

(07:26):
pushing back and not allowingthem to.
So, uh, we're trying to gatherall that data.
You know it's all volunteerbased.
People are just uploading their, their test results.
It's all in anonymous, by theway.
So, uh, you know we takeprivacy super seriously.
You're not like saying thishome, not specifically this home
, but the area around the home,so that you can map it and you
can literally see oh, here ishow the lead has has moved
through thanks to the windpatterns, based upon certifiable

(07:50):
test results.
Or this is how arsenic and soon.
We're breaking it down by thetoxins as well, so that you can
really see how this stuff hasmoved through the town and
through LA.
I think a lot of folks wereforced to move back right, or
maybe didn't realize this andthey just went back and so,

(08:10):
right after, like you guys, asit was happening, left pretty
much right away.
It was a scary thing to leaveyour home right away.
I mean we were evacuated.
I mean technically, we leftbefore we were technically
evacuated.
I mean technically, we leftbefore we were technically
evacuated because we were insome ways warned thanks to this

(08:33):
local weatherman.
And when I say local weatherman, I don't mean like a guy on TV,
I mean a guy that has his ownPatreon that does hyper local
weather for Altadena.
That's cool.
This unbelievable guy, edgarMcGregor, and single-handedly
this guy and his Patreon, Ithink saved countless lives
because he warned folks ahead oftime that, hey, these winds are

(08:56):
going to be unprecedented andif a fire is to break out, that
it will be near impossible forit to be stopped.
So get ready to get out.
He said that a week or so aheadof time.
A week ahead of time, yeah, alot of us were informed of this
idea that these Santa Ana windswere going to be huge and that
if any fire breaks out, just getready to bounce.

(09:17):
And that's exactly what we did.
We just were like you know what?
We see?
The fire on the mountain, eventhough it was miles and miles,
you know, at least 10 miles awayfrom us.
Specifically, we were likelet's just get out of here.
You know, let's just get out of.
These winds are absolutelyinsane.
I've never seen anything likethem.
Um, that are, you know, once ina hundred years kind of thing
Santa Ana winds.
And so, yeah, because becauseof that guy and because of

(09:40):
Patreon, we got out of there.
It's, it's amazing.
It's amazing, glad, glad.
This person can be so helpful,because I could imagine just
what happened with people whenpeople didn't leave.
They they just ran into asituation where they're all
crowded and trying to get outand they don't get to take all
the stuff or they get trapped.
Well, that was exactly what Iwas specifically worried about.

(10:00):
I was like you know what,before we even got our
evacuation order, I was likelet's just get out of here, just
in case it gets crazy clogged.
Like why even bother?
Uh, messing with it?
Plus, we had we didn't havepower at the time.
So you know, we have afive-year-old and we're having
like a candlelit taco dinner.
We're like why don't we justnot be here?
Let's do this somewhere else.
Yeah, yeah, we didn't know thatwe were not gonna be able to
return.
Honestly, at that time that wewere leaving, it was like we sat

(10:24):
in our home.
It felt like our home was sofar away.
But if it ever got to us areyou kidding me?
This whole place would have toburn down.
And that's literally whattranspired.
I can't believe it.
So I still can't believe it.
What are some of the key lessonsyou learned from going through
this that we should all thinkabout in terms of being prepared

(10:47):
.
It's one thing to say forsomeone to be prepared we talk
about it in Northern Californiamore it's like be prepared for
the next earthquake, and we sortof have some things tied down.
The bigger buildings are forcedto renovate themselves or make
them seismic ready.
Some people have a to-go bag orgo bag, but I think most don't

(11:13):
other than having, maybe,earthquake insurance.
Most people don't do very much.
What are some lessons you'drecommend to all of us,
learnings that you represent?
Yeah, I mean, this is such likea lesson in, like you know, uh,
assessing your own level of risk, uh, and we've been through
this now twice in some waysright with the pandemic and now

(11:36):
the la wildfires.
So my risk, personal riskassessment is and especially now
that I have family, um is, Idon't want to take any chances.
I don't necessarily want to goso far as to like build a bunker
80 feet down underneath my homeor anything like that, or you
know, I think there's some, butI think there is.
There are measured steps thatyou can take to prepare yourself

(11:57):
that are reasonable and, at thevery least, it starts by
checking out whatever the youknow public health guidelines
are in your, in your region.
I mean, I think that is like ano-brainer and these go bags are
pretty cheap and you can putone in each of your cars and,
you know, have one under yourbed and they're like 80 bucks

(12:18):
each or something like that, andget them on amazon and they'll
have water for three days.
They have, you know, basic foodsupply.
Like there's stuff that you canabsolutely do, simple things
like hey, don't throw away yoursneakers.
Um, you know old sneakers likestick, stick those under your
bed, so you have sneakers.
If you wake up and there's anearthquake and glasses shattered
and there's a bunch of glassshattered between you and your

(12:39):
kid's room, well then you canslip on your shoes and not, and
you know like there's likethere's like sort of really
simple things that these andthere's these websites that have
it all.
And you know, now you have AI,so you can just ask the question
.
You can have a conversationwith Gemini and or or whatever
you'd like to use and and golike hey, how should I, I live
around here, how should Iprepare for the you know, uh, uh

(12:59):
, events that I, by the way, I'mutilizing AI so so much to help
me in a bunch of different ways, but specifically, I'm using it
to go up against when I need togo up against insurance and

(13:19):
having it break down myinsurance policy for me.
I'll write an angry letter andthen I'll say, hey, make this
less angry and make this soundprofessional, polite but firm.
And it will do it.
And, and it's been so wildlyhelpful, um, in tracking all
that stuff.
So you know, you've got to useall the tools that are at your
disposal when you're talkingabout your family survival and,
um, so I, yeah, so have a, havea go bag, keep sneakers under

(13:44):
your bed, yeah, yeah, maybe havethat old pair of sneakers in
your car.
Have a change of clothes inyour car, uh, uh, no, shut off
stuff like gas and water beforeyou go.
Um, I think you did some ofthat gas, water, electricity,
electricity you can't.
It's hard, honestly.
We did some of that, but themost important thing is to just
get the hell out of there, likethat's.
The thing is that I talked, youknow, right afterwards I was
talking to this fire captain whoI happened to run into at a

(14:07):
friend's house when we werecouch surfing.
He's this guy who's working.
He was off from the wildfires.
He was like on a you know, ashift off and I was like going
through a list of things that Ithought I totally messed up.
On right I was like, oh man,you know, I didn't shut off the
gas.
Actually, I didn't like therewere certain things that we
didn't do and he was like noneof that matters.

(14:28):
He's like you guys got out.
Uh, he's like none of that isgoing to be the reason that your
house burns down.
Like, yeah, I was like, oh man,I left, like a, you know, I had
like an extra gas.
Can that?
I that I, you know, freakingout about that.
I was like, man, I left, I tiedit down, but I didn't have time
to like I didn't know, I didn'twant to dump it out, I didn't
know what to do with it, youknow.
So I just, you know, I forgotabout it and I was so freaked

(14:51):
out and he was like none of thatis going to be the reason your
house burns down.
He's like these are a hundredmiles an hour, winds that are
like blow torching homes.
He's like there's nothing youcould have done that would have
stopped your home from burning.
So let go of that guilt or thatfear that this was somehow your
fault or you could have donesomething.

(15:11):
He's like you did.
The most important thing youand your family got out All
right, let's shift gears alittle bit.
So what's the biggest challengesfor you from this this 100 plus
year?
Eventyear event Wildfire as itrelates to the business and
entertainment industry.
So a lot of news happeningabout production happening

(15:33):
overseas.
Yet another challenge toHollywood after the pandemic and
the writer's strike and theactor's strike, yeah.
So how do you view this currentenvironment as a result of all
this?
Or has this been a time wherethere's a massive creativity?
Or maybe both?
I think that's to come.

(15:53):
Probably the massive creativityin some ways, or at least the
evidence of that.
I'm sure that I think any sortof trauma leads to art in some
capacity, because that's the waywe process things as human
beings.
So I'm eager to see.
I just watched a movie theother day called Seven Days.
That was a beautiful rom-comthat was set in the time of

(16:14):
COVID and I was like, oh yeah,that's right, cool art comes
from our group trauma.
So I'm sure that's going to bewhat will be the result of of
this as well.
But you know, yeah, the, the itdoes feel like, in many ways,
the sky is falling.
If you were, you know, like me,set out to LA to become a

(16:38):
filmmaker and you see how thestudio system is sort of
collapsing and and you justlisted off all these major
events that have that havereally curbed our, our ability
to, um, at least plug into thethe existing infrastructure and
systems that were in place forus to effectively, um, make a

(17:01):
living, uh, have a middle-classlifestyle, um, and still create
art.
That that's really what I thinkHollywood was, was really able
to do, or, or at least the sortof uh negotiations that sprung
up between, or or the, the, thesort of ecosystem that sprung up
around the studio and and and,um, the various unions, right,

(17:22):
like, we sort of created thislittle ecosystem that was
self-sustaining, where peoplecould have a middle-class
lifestyle, um, and and be aworking actor, not have to take
another job, be available forauditions at any time of the day
, um, you know, and not beworking a full-time job, so, so
that all that stuff, we'reseeing that infrastructure
crumble before our very eyes,and so that's, yeah, that's

(17:46):
wildly challenging.
So that's happening.
I mean we have.
I think your friend Matt talkedabout this.
Right, that the reason he canyou know, you can have super
high quality people be ready atany time is because of the
unions.
And, right, I'm one of thesebusiness school sort of folks I

(18:07):
come out of.
Oh, we don't like anybody inthe way of getting things done.
We want a free market, but in away, basically, the unions
enable a super high qualitymarket for people, because if
you're not available, you're notgoing to get access to the
highest quality people.

(18:27):
If those folks have to justjump from big project to big
project, they're going to findthings more consistent and
stable.
Exactly, and it's also why, whenyou do book a job, you get paid
really, really well and peoplesay, wow, that's your day rate.
That's insane.
You make like $2,000 a day orwhatever.
And it's like, yeah, if we wereworking 350 days of the year,

(18:50):
then I'm sure that would be acrazy rate, crazy.
Yeah, you're not working thatamount, so you need to get that
stuff, you need to get thoseresiduals.
Those are the things that allowyou to essentially, in the
downtimes, be training you whenit's your time to, when you book
a job and you're actually up atbat, um, so, but yeah, that

(19:10):
that kind of infrastructure is,is is sort of falling apart.
And then, yeah, I think, with ai, is that is that because of?
Is that because of the rise ofstreaming, or is that?
Is there something about thispart of it specific to the
wildfires has the wildfires justchallenged that?
No, I think the wildfires islike, yeah, just just

(19:31):
exacerbated it exactly.
It's sort of like if, if therewas a scab that was starting to
come over because of, uh, youknow, the strikes and the
pandemic and all the other andthe nai and and all that, like
if there were, if there was, hey, a scab is starting to form.
This is okay.
This just ripped that scab offagain and sort of exacerbated
the wound.
But yeah, you know that, fromfrom our perspective, this is

(19:55):
what I love about working withAnand Shah, who's also the
producer of this podcast and and, and my COO at F and funny, my
production company is that wereally just we constantly just
look at ourselves in the mirrorand say, hey, what can we do?
The two of us do to keep ourcreativity flowing, to keep us

(20:17):
afloat, to keep our, you knowincome coming in, revenue coming
in, you know hell or high water.
We just have that mentality oflike, we are going to be those.
We're going to be those weedsthat survived the apocalypse.
You know, the ones that we'regoing to be the like, uh,
stubborn weed that comes upthrough the cracks.

(20:37):
We're never going to go away.
Exactly Our roots are justgoing to go.
So we're going to find thatjust one little, you know ounce
of water that's buried deep toto keep us alive and keep us
moving and keep us making stuff.
Um, and I think the other thingwe do, the other thing we do to
become Hardy is is have reallysincere, authentic relationships

(20:59):
with our, with our communityand the people that we've worked
with for 20 years, and we careabout these people and we, we,
we try to bring them aboard.
If our ship's not totally sunk,then come on aboard and see how
you can grab an oar and we cantry to figure out how to, uh,
you know, do a cool project withyou.
Like that's the thing we'redoing with reika.
Yeah, I love that.

(21:19):
I love that.
I think this is uh, this isstraight out of.
You had two really interestinginnovations.
You've done many of them.
Right, you were in the webworld doing productions before
it was cool.
You were doing interactive asin choose your own ending or

(21:42):
choose your own story worldbefore it was, before it became
interesting or became cool orbig yet, and now you're playing
the.
You know, I don't think it'seven big yet, but it could be,
it will be.
I'm still.
I'm ahead of the time.
You're ahead of the time.
Yeah, I'm ahead of the head ofthe time.
Your time will come on that one, and then the, the, that one

(22:02):
and then the, the like.
You just did a production right, your dc quest right, and, and
what was interesting is how yougot it funded.
And now you're going to do amovie and how you got it funded
right through the crowd, throughcrowdsourcing.
Talk about that.
That's really interesting.
Yeah, look, I don't think um,hollywood was ever um, just
handing things out to SouthAsian directors, necessarily Not

(22:29):
to play the race card per se,but it is.
People do hire, people tend tohire those or feel connected to
stories that reflect their ownright.
And so, then, the people thatare in power they're of a
certain demographic or of acertain whatever it is race,
culture, whatever you want tocall it, are just going to

(22:51):
inevitably be attracted toprojects or creators of a
certain ilk, and I think it'ssubconscious, and I don't think
that anybody's overtly trying tosuppress South Asian voices.
But my point is that there wasno easy paths to it.
We didn't, like the MindyKalings and the Hassan Minaj of

(23:12):
the world grew, came, you know,with us, like we, we are that
generation essentially.
We didn't have the sort of, youknow, the grandfathers and
grandmothers before us pullingus up, necessarily in Hollywood
specifically.
So, like you know, thegrandfathers and grandmothers
before us pulling us up,necessarily in Hollywood
specifically.
So like, um, you know we haveto carve that out for ourselves.
Uh, and so all that to say, um,when you have a project that

(23:36):
you're passionate about or acreator's voice who you want to
uplift and put and put out there, you know a story that you're
desperate to tell you, you justdo whatever the hell it takes to
make it happen.
And and part of that for merecently has been recognizing
that, hey, in the the 20 yearsI've been out here and doing

(23:56):
stuff for the, you know like,like the guild you mentioned and
the legend of neil and thingsthat have a fan base, maybe not
like a oh, my show was on hbofan base, but a show that's
really touched people's heartsand and that and I mean people
people still follow you, theystill buy merchandise, they.
They still, when you're at aconvention, dress up like you
guys do, from there to dress upas your, for whatever reason I

(24:18):
mean there's whatever reason,yeah, whatever reason that they
really connected, deeplyconnected, to the stuff that we
made.
I think they felt representedby it.
You know we were making showsabout, you know, video people
who love video games, peoplelove gaming quote unquote nerds,
people who felt like they werethe underdogs who's, who were

(24:39):
only picked on in media, who areonly looked down upon in media
as the butt of jokes in media,who were only looked down upon
in media as the butt of jokes,and we gave them voices from an
authentic point of view, becausewe are gamers and we are nerds
and we were like no, we can becool.
I mean we literally have aguild song called I'm the one.
That's cool.
That was like a rock song thatwe put on YouTube that has some
millions of views and I thinkthat's because we'd like really

(25:00):
touched these people in a waythat they felt, hey, I like, I
feel like I am beloved in this,um, and I, you know, and they're
speaking for my, for my voiceand I, and what I've recognized
now is that you know these,these are fans in the sense, but
there are.
They're also like uh, uhadvocates.
They're like, they're likepeople who just care so much

(25:22):
that they want to see your thingget made and they really go to
bat for you.
You know thousands of people tosay yes to our product, uh, or
our project, instead of beggingfor and trying to convince the.

(25:47):
You know the suit at the top ofparamount or whatever.
Those are gatekeepers.
They have a job.
Their job is to enable themillions of dollars that they
have at their disposal and thedistribution channels that they
have to to get out to market.
And now there's thisalternative channel that you
know before you could dosomething potentially on youtube
and just put it out right, andsome people have risen

(26:08):
spectacularly through that.
But you still have to get highquality productions funded
somehow.
Right, it's hard to go from.
It's hard to go from somethingkind of chintzy to then getting
it funded in a big way, andyou've done actually a lot of
that too, um, but then in thiscase you utilize crowdsourcing
Right.
So for Desi Quest, which is aDungeons Dragons show, which

(26:30):
people are like, what's aDungeons Dragons show?
What they're maybe not seeingis that these Dungeons Dragons
shows are selling out MadisonSquare Garden.
These are becoming a reallyvalid form of entertainment that
again, people feel very seen bythem.
And so we're like well, we wantto do one that's from a South

(26:53):
Asian perspective, like let's.
You know, we have such a richmythology.
You know our culture is sosteeped in incredible stories of
, you know, whether it's Hanumanor the Mahabharata or you know,
all these like reallyincredible ancient stories that

(27:13):
I feel like are reallyunderrepresented, at least in
the Western world for sure.
And so we're like oh well,let's do D&D kind of with that
influence with a bunch of SouthAsian.
You know improvisers andperformers and you know.
So what better way to see ifyour idea that you think is cool
actually has resonance than toput it out there for a crowdfund

(27:36):
, to see if anybody's willing toput their money where their
mouth is.
And you know, we had 2,608people do that, to the tune of
$150,000, and was able to fund aseason of that, and from there
the show has grown.
We did a mini season, we'vedone a lot.
So you raised, so crowdfunded,you raised, you set out to raise

(27:59):
$50,000.
Yeah, and like, within hours Ithink Six, six hours we hit our
goal.
Yeah, hit your goal, which hitthe algorithm and got you listed
on the front page ofkickstarter.
That was brilliant.
Yeah, they became a project welove on kickstarter, which is
great we love.

(28:19):
You want that badge, you wantthat.
And it popped, it popped fromthere and kept going.
Yeah, I think at the time ithit your stretch goal.
I mean, this was it was pre-ElonTwitter and so really it was
like the Twitter sphere wasabuzz with it, like all the
massive TTRPG players were allretweeting it and supporting it.

(28:40):
And from there, I think it justsort of sort of caught, you
know, caught steam and caughtfire a bit.
And then, and then after that,after that, you had, you had the
show, you put it out.
You, you basically pioneered a,the, the, you know basically
the tabletop role player gameright, didn't Zandris and

(29:03):
dragons, which is very differentformat than watching a typical
show.
Right, yeah, built this veryloyal audience and then from
that, you were able to turn itinto something even bigger.
Yeah, it's kind of likewatching an improvised fantasy
novel happen before your veryeyes, with a group of
storytellers who collectivelytell a story together, and then

(29:26):
there's this gamified elementwith dice, that sort of
randomize what's going to happen.
It's a really cool format.
And, yeah, I mean we createdthe show.
I measure the success.
My metric for success is the uhnumber of characters per

(29:51):
comment.
So it's not just, hey, do weget millions of views or we get
all this stuff.
The fact that people wrote,like you know, a two-page
comment of how that show madethem feel, feel seen, feel heard
, the like we got a lot of like.
This is the show I never knew Ineeded in my life, and
especially from secondgeneration immigrants of all,

(30:12):
all types, not just South Asians, and you know that to me was
okay.
We have struck a nerve now.
Now the job is to not give up,to keep creating uh, which is
not giving up, but uh, and thenjust getting more attention for
the show.
Let's stop there for a second.
Okay, because I want to,because when I first saw that

(30:35):
first episode right of thisequest I didn't know what to do
with it.
Okay, because I'm used toproduced shows.
Right, well, this is a prettyshow.
It is a produced show and I'mused to something that you know,
but there's, this was so.
This was like much longer thana typical show.
Right, it's a couple hours orlonger and it was.

(31:00):
You know, I've seen you do andseen you and many of your
friends who've gone on to doincredible things do improv, and
this was like a form of bothtogether and I think what was
unique about it.
You have to really live andfeel that story as something
much greater, a greatercommitment, and, as a result,

(31:21):
when you get those comments thatare two pages you're getting
someone who is investing in youin that level of depth.
They're expressing passion forit, which is what you really
want in anything you do.
You want people who aremaniacally passionate.
Yeah, no, I think it's not a.
You're right, I see what youmean by produce.

(31:42):
Now, you mean like, oh, I'm,when you watch a show, you're
very much.
If you're watching Last of Us,you are watching these
characters play out the story ina very visceral way.
Is that you're sitting around atable, you're sort of orally

(32:05):
telling the story, together as agroup, inhabiting characters,
playing encounters and thesethings, but you're kind of
voicing them almost like in apodcast style.
This is why I liken it to anovelization.
It's like when you pick up afantasy book.
Sometimes you need to get topage 200 before you're like holy

(32:25):
cow, now I'm into this worldand and, and you're right, it
does require a little bit ofpatience or at least an
understanding of of what you'resort of getting into.
But I also feel like it'sprobably what people first said
when Joe Rogan was like doing afour hour podcast.
You know, like, like, why thehell am I going to listen to
this jerk talk for four hours?
You know, um, and it's like youknow it's a different way of of

(32:47):
connecting.
But you know with, with story,um, and and and I think in some
ways, if a deeper, moremeaningful way um than you know
your your traditional sort of,you know your traditional fair
on that you might find on TV andfilm.
Yeah, I think it'sfundamentally.

(33:07):
I think that's why it's sellingout Madison Square Garden.
I think it's why it's sellingout Madison Square Garden right
now.
These guys that are on Dimension20 and Critical Role have such
gigantic followings and it'sbecause they are again.
They're just connecting withpeople on such a deep level with

(33:28):
their storytelling, and you'refinding that same effect for the
South Asian version, whereyou've mixed in mythology, hindu
mythology.
I would assume a lot of this issourced from that.
You're blending into this story, right into this equest story,
and then from that it's so it'snot just hindu, it's, it's, it's

(33:49):
sick, it's islamic, it's like,yeah, it's like, it's like all
the it really is.
We try to be sort of likenon-denominationally south asian
about it.
Um, so that it could be, youknow, just as inclusive as
possible.
You're borrowing stories andelements and create weapons and
characters from all these placesand they are they just feel
actually, if you come at it fromafar, pretty related, because

(34:13):
all the stories mix and for sureit's beautiful, yeah.
So then you take that and youbuild a relationship with ricka.
Right, that's right.
And then from there, whathappened?
Yeah, so Rekha Shankar is areal up-and-coming, incredible
comedic talent.
She was the head writer atCollege Humor.

(34:35):
So what I did for DesiQuest wasI needed to have our own South
Asian Avengers.
I was like what's every SouthAsian that's ever been on one of
these like sort of hit TTRPGshows and can I meet them and
can I get them all to cometogether, right?
So Reiko was one of them.

(34:55):
She was on Dimension 20, whichis a big show on a network
called Dropout, and you know she, she said, she said yes, she'd
be into it and from there shewas an absolute superstar on the
show.
She's like one of the funniestpeople on the show.
She plays a character calledLudduwanti, which is an auntie

(35:16):
that is a barbarian and it makespowerful Ludduws that do all
these magical things.
She plays a very kind of um, uh, I don't want to say
stereotypical, but like anauntie.
You know, uh, who is.

(35:37):
If you're south asian, you willknow what.
You will know this auntie.
You know auntie, auntie, whatdoes auntie mean?
You know, yeah, uncle andauntie and I even say this, I
say this to my team sometimesstop being an uncle.
You know they're like, okay,I'm not gonna be, I'm not gonna
be so preachy, what to do?
So kind of one-dimensional.

(35:57):
But you play, yeah, this is anobvious texture and persona.
It is, it is, she plays, she,she's, she's a barbarian in all
the ways.
And you know those aunties thatare like, yes, they will shame
you for eating too much or noteating enough or whatever it is,
but then they also will be theones that will, if anyone talk,
talk shit about you, they're thefirst ones to be like they're

(36:17):
going to throw down, yeah,exactly, their hearts.
So for you, it's like you.
It's like your mom they gotthat mom gene.
They're going to be like theTigris and just like that's
right, yeah, that's right,they're gonna be like the
tigress.
I'm just like that's right,yeah, that's right.
They'll.
They'll tear down mount,they'll, they'll, they'll do
what it takes to make sureyou're okay, um.
And so that's that's who she isfor the anyway, she was so

(36:39):
hilarious and all that.
And then and this is the thing,that, how we approach projects
with creators that we'reinterested in working with, we
always ask them hey, what's thatproject that no one is green
lighting, that you just can'tstop thinking about, what's that
, that script that you can't,you just can't put away and you
keep coming back to andeverybody says you're crazy and
you know, like that kind ofthing, like what is that project

(37:01):
for you, um?
And for Rekha, it was thismovie that she was working on,
um.
That was, um had a really cool,fun sci-fi hook.
It's essentially it was.
It was a movie that she wrote,um, in the wake of her
grandfather's passing, um and uh, and and the sort of the

(37:21):
challenges like that that shefelt during the 13 day Hindu
ceremony.
For for, uh, we have this likesort of it's kind of like
sitting Shiva type thing, butit's like this 13 days ceremony,
there's all these like ritesand rituals and like pujas and
things that happen.
But she had a difficult as asecond generation.

(37:42):
She had a difficult time likesort of understanding what was
going on.
Everyone has a different, everyuncle has a different
interpretation of what'shappening.
Is she grieving the right way?
And in that angst she felt like, am I a good hindu?
Am I just like the worst hinduin the world?
Like I don't understand, like Idon't know how to grieve my own
grandmother or grandfather inthis case.
Um, that is a proper way, yeah,and so then we.

(38:03):
Then she wrote the twist thatthe sci-fi twist of our story is
that, um, uh, in the middle ofthis, the hindu rapture occurs
and every hindu on the face ofthe planet is taken away except
for her, therefore therebyproving that she is the world's
worst hindu.
Uh, and it's like what?
What happens now?
Um, and I just I fell in lovewith the script.

(38:24):
I was already like sort of inlove with with, with Rika's
comedic abilities, and I waslike, how you know, I just said
yes with my full being.
Uh, like, how do I help youmake this movie in whatever way,
shape and form?
You know, and I also knew Ireally wanted to direct the
movie.
But really my first place ofcoming from it was like, how do
I just help you get this intothe world?

(38:47):
If my directing is what helpsthat, then let's do it.
If not, I'll help in whateverway I can.
And then I pitched myself asdirector eventually and she was
like, yeah, let's do this, let'smake this thing.
And then it became another thingto crowdfund.
And then you put it together.
Yeah, you put your communitytogether as part of it.
She has her community, you havea community, you have some

(39:08):
intertwined members of that.
And then, with that group, youguys put together another
Kickstarter campaign and Ithought this one you raised you
blew out even faster.
You hit over $250,000 veryquickly, like almost no time.
Right, your initial limit wasset at 50 and you blew that out,

(39:28):
but there was a way in whichyou launched the campaign that
got you more visibility.
Of course, as you know, I'minto go-to-market, so there's
ways in which you've launched itthat drove it even faster.
So maybe you could share someof those tips with us.
So what we did for this one thatwas very different than Daisy
Quest, is that we decided tohave like a launch show.

(39:49):
A lot of us are performers.
We obviously have relationshipswith really great performers
and we thought, hey, let's seeif we can call in that one favor
, get a kind of best of the besttogether and let's do a show
that effectively it's a showformat that pitches the movie to

(40:10):
the audience.
So it is an improv show that isabout Rekha telling the world
this is the movie I want to makeand this is why I want to make
it, and that's sort of the likethrough line of the actual show.
But then we like gamify variouselements of that, uh, in improv

(40:31):
games throughout the show andwe got to get we brought
together a cast that if, again,if you were in like our circles,
or if you were in the world ofttrpg or in the world of improv
comedy, you would be like thisis a super group.
We essentially put togetherlike, oh, it was amazing.
I like the temple of the dog,yeah, for I kind of fell into it

(40:54):
.
Yeah, I had this youtube.
I had youtube up and you knowhow youtube suggests things for
you.
Um, it becomes part of my lateat night when I'm just viewing
stuff and my wife's not up andwe've watched our normal shows,
I'll put it on.
And then this one came up and Iwas like, oh, I, I didn't know
there was a one hour show aboutabout.

(41:15):
Yeah, it was like a one hour,yeah, about about rick has.
We tried to make the pitch aboutour movie the most entertaining
thing you could possibly watch,and that ended up becoming such
a powerful tool for us.
So, first of all, we livestream that on the day of our
launch.
So we had the show live and wehad a packed audience at the

(41:37):
Dynasty Typewriter, which isthis really cool theater in LA
that is like one of the mainhubs of hip comedy in LA these
days.
We packed that house out thesedays.
We packed that house out, uh.
We then had live stream ticketsso that, if you couldn't make
the show, uh, it was availableto everybody around the world to
watch live as well.

(41:58):
Um, and, and our kickstarterwent live that day.
So, um, in like during the showwe are, it's almost like a
telethon.
At that point we're like we'veraised this much at this point,
can we get to this much whilewe're doing the show?
Modernize Jerry Lewis telethon.
Yeah, I think we raisedsomething like 15 grand or
something like that throughoutthe course of the actual show

(42:19):
itself.
But really it was also thenhaving that video as a tool for
attention grabbing throughoutthe entire campaign, because now
, that video, which was doingreally well in the YouTube
algorithm, like you were talkingabout, and we were also cutting
that up into clips, postingthat on TikTok, youtube and

(42:42):
Instagram and wherever else, andso that was just driving a
bunch of awareness.
In a way, it was what replacedTwitter for us from the daisy
quest, because twitter is adifferent vibe now, to put it
mildly.
Um, and so we knew we weren'tgoing to get that same level
score.
A lot of those creators thatwere supporting us the last time

(43:02):
on twitter were left twitter.
Um, so that wasn't going to bewhat.
What was going to do it?
Um, but yeah, we thought, hey,this is the most fun way that we
could tell our like this iswhat we're good.
We, I've been out here for 20years doing improv.
Like this is what we're best at.
Let's do an improv show.
And then we got you know thisjust incredible cast brendan,
lee mulligan, izzy roland,felicia day, uh, from the guild

(43:26):
and, uh, uh like jordan myrick,sam reich, uh, I'm gonna forget
people through through sing,who's gonna be in the movie as
well.
I, I could not stop laughing.
All of these people have like,so, like, just so like such
masters of improv.
Um and uh, we were so lucky tohave them together.
It was great.
Yeah, so it's, it's getting.

(43:47):
So.
It's like around your fundraise,building a vehicle, using your
community of super talentedimprovers to get the message out
.
Of course, you appeared earlyon, they came in.
It was a super clever way ofpromoting, turning it into an
event, and I think that's partof the momentum.
Now we have all these toolsthat we can get in front of

(44:10):
people where we don't needapproval from anyone.
We can create it ourselves andliterally get it all out.
But then, when we get it out,we have to make sure that
everything's aligned with it.
So it's like planned andunplanned and serendipitous
feeling all that coming togetherat once.
Yeah, I mean, I think that'sright.
You have to be super responsive, too, right?
You can't just like likethere's a world in which that

(44:32):
that didn't really take off, sothere's other ways that we have
to drive attention.
And so it wasn't.
We weren't like putting all oureggs in that basket per se, but
it was.
Hey, let's just try thesevarious things, see what is
holding people's attention.
And, and you know, cause that'sit?
Like I was just watching thislike Instagram video the other

(44:55):
day from this creator that Ilove, um, and he did a thing on,
like you know, just like like atip tips on how to, how to, how
to be a creator these days, andone of them was, um, you can't
just create stuff.
You know, the creation of theart is 40% of it, the marketing
of it is 60%, and so then peopleare like, well, so what?

(45:18):
I got to be an editor, I got tobe a cinematographer, I got to
do all these things.
And he was like, no, you don'thave to, you just have to get
people's attention.
And so, whatever the hell way,you want to do that, but you
that that is part of the job ofbeing an artist is, how do you
get people's attention to yourart.
If that's what you want tosustain you and sustain the life
for your family then that hasto be a part, part and parcel of

(45:42):
the design of the art for you.
So, no, you, you don't have tonecessarily be on Instagram or
any of these things.
If that's not how, if, if, ifyou can get attention some other
way that's more efficient foryou or more for that speaks to
you, um, then do that.
But you, you must design someway to get attention when you
are creating your art.

(46:03):
I think that's brilliant andit's a really helpful way for
aspiring creators to understandhow to get this together.
So, in your case, it's acombination of community people
you take care of in a genuineway or take care of you over
time, and it all comes together.
If you know Sandeep, you'll seemany similar people who've been

(46:28):
in various roles with him overtime, right From whether it's
producing or above the line.
Below the line kind of work,right, yeah, they're coming with
you and they carry with you andthey promote with you and all
these connections work with you,and that's working together as

(46:49):
part of taking advantage of themediums that are out there.
Totally.
I always say that wheneverpeople who are new or at a panel
they always ask what's theadvice you give to somebody I
always say listen, treat thepeople that you collaborate with
early on, the people that arein your level 101 improv class,

(47:09):
the people that you collaboratewith early on, the people that
are in your level 101 improvclass, the people that you meet
as junior executives orassistants, or people at the
mailroom of CA that is yourgraduating class.
All those guys.
You guys are all freshmentogether and you guys are going
to rise the ranks together, andso, if you create authentic

(47:30):
relationships with the mosttalented people that you find
that are in that, instead ofstriving to get a senior's
attention and be like I'm goingto date a junior my first day no
, no, no, no, no Focus on thepeople that are around you in
your class.
Who are the most talentedpeople there that you really
jive with?
Who are the people that youreally connect with?
What are their hopes and dreams?
How really jive with?
Who are the people that youreally connect with?

(47:51):
Like, what are their hopes anddreams?
How can you guys work togetherand create a cool class project
together?
And because those people aregoing to be the ones five years
from now that are going to bethe executives and that are
going to be, you know a series,regular and and you can sort of
graduate together If you reallyhave those authentic
relationships that you createdat the start.

(48:15):
In a way, as an aside, in a way,you're going against the grain
of normal human thinking.
A lot of time I wouldn't say we.
When I grew up, you'd find whowas cool and who's not, who to
pick on, who to be friends with,and it goes against that part

(48:36):
of what I thought was humannature.
Whereas you create thesegradations and you pick and
choose amongst them and whatyou're saying is amongst that
group, consider everyone to beinteresting.
Maybe you attach yourself moreto certain folks that jive with
you the most, but you know youdon't need to necessarily put

(48:57):
down others in this, in thisquest, because all those folks,
those folks will be the one younever know what will happen, and
those folks will be the onethat maybe, out of nowhere,
connect you with all sorts ofpeople, all right, and then want
to be part of that tribe ofyours, or you'll just have a
great time with them, and youwill, you will like, at the very
least, even if you don't shootto the moon, you will have an

(49:19):
authentic relationship withpeople that you really love
working with, which is like, inthe end, you know kind of so
much.
It sort of becomes like the likeenjoy the process instead of
the result kind of thing.
Because I think whenever,whenever you're going like hey,
who's out there, that's cool.
What you're doing is you'resetting there's an extrinsic

(49:39):
determinant for what is good andthen measure yourself up to
that versus like intrinsicallyfeeling in your heart of hearts,
like who makes me laugh, whomakes, who moves me when I see
them, who am I always like, likeyou know, riffing with at a
party and we just can't stopcoming up with crazy fun ideas

(50:03):
or or joking with you know, youknow, or who's like, who's
reading my writing, um, justbecause they care about me and
want to see me succeed, and thengives me really great notes and
really cares about it.
That's when you tap into what'sintrinsically going on with
what your own measurement forcool, which should be as like

(50:24):
who's impacting you.
I'd say, don't underestimateyour own gut feel for the kind
of person that could be yourgreat partner or great
collaborator with.
Go with your own.
I would even go so far as tonot just don't underestimate it.
Nurture that gut feel, connectwith that gut feel, have

(50:48):
conversations with that,meditate with that gut feel
Really conversations with that,meditate with that gut feel
really under, go deep within you, understand yourself.
What are you trying to do outhere?
If you're coming out to LA andyou just want to be the next X,
y, z or you just want to make abunch of money, like I, I think
you're going to have a lot, alot harder of a road than if you

(51:08):
go.
Man, I really have this storyto tell.
I really need to get this, thismessage out there, this, this
thing that happened to me, thisthing that's meaningful to me,
out into the world.
Like, if that is yourmotivation, then like and, by
the way, I say this after 20years of doing it the other way
truly like I don't think Iunderstood this for so long.

(51:32):
Really, this is the advice thatI'm like giving to myself, or,
you know, I think we giveourselves that advice every day.
Yeah, I think you realize muchlater.
This is what really works, notnecessarily what others' version
of great is, it's your ownversion.
So, hey, let's go back a littlebit.
Did, um, you were supposed tobe a good, uh, indian son and

(51:57):
when you went to brown, you weresupposed to work in computer
science.
That was your.
That's what you got your degreein.
Yeah, right, that's why, uh,mom, dad, were paying all that
money to go to, for you to go tothis amazing Ivy League school,
indeed.
But then you went into the arts, what got you sparked on it?
Well, that's honestly theirfault for not knowing.
That's their fault for notknowing what Brown University

(52:21):
was, or all of you, or me evenNone of us knew.
I don't think we reallyunderstood.
We were just like, oh, it isIvy League school, yeah, of
course, don't go there.
Go to ivy league school, likethere was.
No, it was the only ivy leagueI got into, and so it was just
like obvious that I was goingthere.
We I mean, I didn't even visitthe school beforehand, like I
don't know how.
Wait, we're not, hold on now.
That's not fair.
My, our parents talked me intogoing to a state school so to

(52:45):
get a scholarship.
So right, you're so funny.
I was literally talking withdad about this yesterday and he
still like, has this deeply heldbelief that you should go to
the cheapest undergrad and thethen go from the most expensive
graduate school.
So, yeah, you're right.
You're right he was.
He was like literally justtalking about that yesterday.
Um, it's hilarious that, uh, no, but my point was is that you

(53:09):
know, brown maybe unbeknownst tous was this like is the most
liberal of the liberal arts,right?
So like they really encourageyou to explore.
I mean, they encourage.
It's like it is.
It's so built on like intrinsicmotivations like what do you
want to explore in in our giantcurriculum offering you can take
any class, pass, fail, you candrop out right before the final

(53:34):
and get an incomplete instead ofa failure.
They set it up so that it'slike we are not going to punish
you for trying something out ofyour wheelhouse and recognizing
whenever you do in that timethat it's not for you.
We want you to try differentthings.
That is built into the dna ofit.
And so I got there.

(53:54):
I fell in with these, with thiswrong crowd of of this wrong
crowd of these very bad people,these very bad improvisers and
comedians and writers andartists.
And you know these are peoplethat went on to be, you know,
writers of the cobalt reportwriters on fallon writer.
You know these are are peoplethat went on to be, you know,
writers of the Colbert Reportwriters on Fallon, right, you
know, these are like incrediblepeople.

(54:16):
And yeah, I just started start.
It's actually kind of it rootsback to being your fault, rajiv.
I don't know if you recognizethis, but I went to Harvard
Summer School Indian boy, right.
And why was I the good Indianboy?
Because in fifth grade I wasgetting Bs.
I got like two Bs or somethinglike that.
And then you said to me hey, ifyou get straight A's, you'll

(54:38):
get a set of baseball cards,knowing that that was, all I
wanted in the world was a set ofbaseball cards.
And so then from that point on,I was Mr Like, I'm getting
straight A's, I want baseballcards.
And so then, from that point on, I was Mr Like, I'm getting
straight A's, I want baseballcards so badly.
So I was very extrinsicallymotivated by baseball cards,
anyway.
So I only had to keep thatincentive for a couple of years,

(54:59):
because once you got hooked,yeah, you never got it, that's
right, but but still like that's, for whatever reason you went
the other way when I went toHarvard summer school and you
were like, hey, cause, I waslike I'm going to take chemistry
and I'm going to take physics,and you're like, don't do that,
take something weird, take, takecreative writing.
And I was like, really Okay.
And so I did.
I took creative writing atHarvard summer school, uh, my,

(55:22):
my senior year or junior year orwhatever that was.
And then, um, I was like it'sthat, that that sort of started
the, the, the artist in me.
It sort of like lit the flame,I think.
And then so then by the time Igot to brown, it was like, yeah,
no, of course I'll get like apractical, pragmatic degree.
I'm not gonna I'm not crazy,you know, or I'm not gonna, I
don't be disowned by my southasian immigrant parents um, like

(55:44):
, like so, but I am gonna, youknow, try to join this improv
troupe and see what that's about.
And by the time time it got tosenior year, I really fell in
love.
I made my first film over thesummer one year and I really
fell in love with to me how itlit up both sides of my brain.
I felt like, for the first timereally in my sort of academic
career did I feel like the leftside and right side of my brain

(56:07):
lit on fire as I produced a film.
I felt like my logic side wasproblem solving, trying to
figure out how we're going toget done in this budget and this
timeline, and then my creativeside was just obviously, how are
we going to tell the story?
So, yeah, I just fell in lovewith filmmaking and I told mom
and dad that I want to move toLA and give it a go and put my

(56:29):
CS degree to the side.
And mom cried and make money.
Yeah, okay, we support you.
I still remember mom sayingokay, we support you, she will
cheer you on.
All right, so that that's.

(56:50):
That was the origin of the sparkthat when you never looked back
, never went back and learned,uh, python and java, oh, I
learned those things definitely.
Yeah, I learned python and java.
Yeah, yeah, I learned all thatin.
In retrospect, like I almostwish I didn't.
I wish I saw CS as a tool forart earlier on and there are

(57:13):
ways in which it has actuallylike you mentioned earlier the
interactive stuff that I did Iwas writing scripts and
pseudocoding as I was creatingChoose your Own Adventure live
action story.
So that was, in a way, it didmake use of my.
I did use my degree at somepoint, yeah, and I'd say that in

(57:33):
general, I think it's reallyuseful to learn, like being
mathematic, to understand themathematical science, structured
logic, understand how to writecode.
I you know, after engineering Iwent into technology sales
instead of actually buildingtechnology products, and then
later, when I started companies,I always saw it as writing a

(57:53):
set of procedures.
You design your business as aset of almost code modules and
where everything works together.
That's cool.
These are components that needto flow together.
These are components that needto flow together, and so you

(58:18):
want to make it so that eachorganizational unit or
functional unit can run on itsown while interacting with the
others, and you want that codeto be extensible to a certain
extent.
So if you scale, you don'tbreak the basic infrastructure
of your basic program.
Yeah, so listen, yeah, thatmakes total sense.
You know what I find with, withmy artistic pursuit and I wonder
if you feel the same way,actually, as an entrepreneur is

(58:39):
that it sort of uses all partsof the buffalo in the sense of
like, all like I have because ofmy pursuit of being a filmmaker
.
It has used every experienceI've had growing up, and nothing
is wasted.
At some point, like, oh, I'm onset, people are like, oh, you

(59:01):
were a gymnast, can you do abackflip?
Yeah, sure, okay, great, let'sput that in the music video that
we're shooting.
Everything that I thought waslike why did I do that in my
life?
Why did I waste my time?
No, it actually sort of cameback in to the art in some some
way shape or form.
You sort of you end up miningevery little bit of your life

(59:21):
experience so that you can, youknow, pursue your dream of
becoming a filmmaker or, youknow, tell this interest story
in the most unique way or themost from you point of view way
that you can.
I don't know if that's that'strue of entrepreneurs.
I totally feel that way.
I, um, I'm in growth marketing,digital marketing, with a

(59:45):
worldwide team serving primarilytechnology-centric clients.
Even the dental clients or eventhe more basic businesses are
now technology-centered and Ifind that in getting to those
clients all the sales skills Ilearned when I was at NCR back

(01:00:09):
in the day National cashregister when I went for a year
of sales training they give youa year of graduate sales
training and the most importantlessons I learned was not just
in.
I was in that class and thenthis amazing guy that I should
keep in touch with Rich Lutz,who taught me about major

(01:00:29):
account selling, should keep intouch with rich lutz, who taught
me about major account sellingand he taught me, he, he.
One of the great lessons hetaught me was um, I was a
salesperson.
I was running all over the thenew england area talking to all
these big companies gte, ge,pepsi trying to sell these
computing systems right, pcs andservers.
Right there you'll pentium,pentium PCs and multi-unit

(01:00:54):
servers.
And he sat down with me one dayand he said Rajiv, let me just
teach you a little bit aboutsales.
I've been at this for 20 plusyears.
So say, you're successful atPepsi, you sell a bunch of
machines.
You're sitting here in Hartford, connecticut.
You sell a bunch there, andthen you sell a bunch here at

(01:01:17):
ITT Hartford, which at the timewas now the Hartford Insurance
Company.
What's going to happen to younext year?
I don't know, rich, I'll justmake a bunch of money.
Hit my numbers.
He's like no, rajiv, they'regoing to split your territory in
half and they're gonna get.
You're gonna have to choosewhich one you want.
So, like I'm sitting, you'resitting here with the three big

(01:01:39):
insurance companies that are allit driven.
Where you can work with me,I'll, I'll do the strategy.
You know, he's the senior guygetting a stretch.
I'm just 20 old kid sellingthat hardware and he's like you
guy getting the strategy.
I'm just 20 year old kidselling the hardware and he's
like you can.
Basically, we can work togetherhere where you can literally
focus on these few places andnail it, or you can run around

(01:02:00):
like a chicken with your headcut off, all over the state, all
over the region.
What do you want to do?
And it was like wow, you know,prioritize, wow, prioritize.
Pick a few things, go superdeep in them, pick a community
of folks.
We ended up building an accountteam together that just went
after these insurance companies,each one of us with different

(01:02:20):
competencies, and we made itwork.
And so those lessons are withme to this day.
Whenever I think of our folks,us running around, we can take
on this client, that client,this client, that thing.
Think of our folks, us runningaround, we can take on this
client, that client, this client, that thing.
It's like no, no, let's focuson particular areas where we can
be really awesome, because youonly have so much time and you
only have so much energy tofocus in a few places and really

(01:02:45):
differentiate yourself, andeven then it's hard.
Yeah, exactly yeah, that's whatI mean.
I guess, like you know, younever know what life experience
is going to rear its head backinto your life later and what
sticks with you and like, yeah,everything that you think was,
or something that you think wastotally a waste of time, ends up
being this useful thing.
I just feel like it's like,yeah, using all parts of the
Buffalo, except that you're theBuffalo.

(01:03:05):
Yeah, no, I agree, I think youis you.
No, I agree, I think you needto be able to go back, even if
you think something's wasted.
You never know when it'll popup in your life, and you have to
be.
I think part of it is Idismissed many things that I did
and now, as I get older, I'mmore open to those things coming

(01:03:28):
back and serving as lessons orgood stories that inform where
I'm going.
Okay, we are.
In terms of self-improvement,what area of your filmmaking
craft are you trying to work onright now?
Um, so, I'm I'm trying to studyum other independent film

(01:03:51):
that's like roughly in our samebudget level to really get a
sense of what I find reallyappealing about them, like what
they do really well, you know,with their limited resources.
How do they make how does thismovie?
Let's take Seven Days as anexample of the movie that I was
just talking about.
Let's take Seven Days as anexample of the movie that I was

(01:04:21):
just talking about.
It was a movie where two peoplewere shot in one location the
entire time.
How did they make it not feelclaustrophobic?
At a certain point in the movieyou kind of lose yourself to
the story apartment, I mean,every angle you could possibly
imagine and it never felt stalevisually and I thought that lent
itself to making the movie feellike it had big scope, even
though it was literally shot inan apartment.
And you know, part of that wasactually I watched that movie

(01:04:43):
with my community.
So I have this thing where Ihave a Patreon that if folks can
sort of be with me on thejourney of making this movie, if
they contribute to our Patreon,and then they can watch these
movies with me and then we havea little discussion afterwards.
And that's been so valuable tohave these conversations with
the people that are going tothat have already.

(01:05:04):
Many of them have also kickedin for the Kickstarter, of
course, and so they're just like.
It's like having constantaudience feedback throughout the
process and that's been justgenuinely so inspiring and
helpful, because you're notgetting notes and ideas from

(01:05:24):
executives who have like sort ofthe ulterior motive of keeping
their job.
You're getting it from the fansthat really love and care about
film or care about your projecttoo.
So they're really like, and I'mtelling you that the stuff that
I hear from them is so valuableit's more valuable than a

(01:05:46):
Paramount exec who's been or canbe just as valuable.
You wouldn't sneeze at theParamount exec that helps you
with your next movie no, ofcourse, not your version of the
Mahabharata that's coming out ina couple years.
In fact, anand would say thistoo, who worked at Paramount,
which is why I keep picking onit.
He would say, in some ways,we've all done the 10,000 hours

(01:06:10):
of watching content, you know.
So we have our own sort ofexpertise around what matters to
us, what moves us.
We may not know thetechnicalities behind how
everything's produced per se,but we know what is impactful to
us.
So I'm constantly surveyingthat with my community, and
these, again, are the peoplethat are going to be the loudest

(01:06:31):
advocates for it and thedeepest supporters.
So, yeah, I think it's that I'mjust trying to really stretch
myself, really trying tounderstand my crutches and my
go-tos which tends to be goofycomedy at times, or or sophomore

(01:06:51):
comedy or whatever it is andreally try to get to something a
little bit deeper emotionally.
And so, yeah, just kind of juststretching myself a little bit
and and you know, making myselfa little uncomfortable, cause I
think that's where the, the nextsort of iteration of, of of
artistry will come for me.
I like that.
It's in that discomfort.

(01:07:12):
I like that that you're usingand I think you're doing this
even as you are doing the movieright, vidya's Guide for the
Afterlife.
You've documented for everyonethat's supported you, or on your
email list, the process you'vegone through, what you did to

(01:07:35):
get there, how much the net isafter you pay all the different
expenses for fundraising.
They feel like they're on yourjourney and because you're
transparent like that, they canfeed back to you.
I feel similarly about thecommunity I'm working with.
I think in many ways you'remore open than I am and you just
throw yourself out there and Ithink your community lifts you

(01:07:56):
up, and it's one of the thingswe I need to do better, which is
ask for help.
It's very Brene Brown of me,you know, just trying to be a
vulnerable warrior, a leaderthrough vulnerability.
Well, you know what we're goingto do now.

(01:08:19):
We're going to go to the game.
Okay, great, are we stillcalling it the Spark Tank?
We're calling it the Spark Tank.
Welcome to the Spark Tank.
Today, we're thrilled to haveour very own co-host, sandeep
Parikh, joining us in the hotseat.
Sandeep has not read the script.
Sandeep, your mind is afascinating landscape of

(01:08:40):
creativity, from the cultphenomenon of the Guild to
directing web series and evendiving deep into the world of
tabletop RPGs With AC Quest.
You are constantly forging newpaths.
This is the ultimate wordassociation challenge where
every response can unlock a newdimension of your creative
process or reveal the colorfulchaos when we open our brain of

(01:09:02):
a professional improviser.
This is where storytellingmeets spontaneous thought, where
digital innovation collideswith the art of human connection
and where a single word willunlock a universe of unexpected
ideas.
So here's how it works.
I start with a word andsuddenly you respond with the
first word that comes to yourmind okay, okay, I was like okay

(01:09:23):
, do I have to do a monologue orsomething?
Okay, no, just a word.
Okay, it was a monologue, gotit to get to word association
and we'll go back and forth.
So, so, suddenly, are you readyto see where your synopses take
us?
Yeah, yeah, okay, let's see.
Oh, all right, I'm gonna emptymy mind.

(01:09:43):
This is gonna be.
There is no, there is no.
Big, really huge, uh, unique,really huge, unique New York,
unique New York.
Okay, is that something?
I should learn to speak better?
Okay, here we go, play, improv,acting, emotion, authenticity,

(01:10:08):
vulnerability, vulnerability,depth, richness, richness.
Go there.
Why did you say richness,richness?
Why did I say richness,richness?
Well, I guess I was trying todig deep, and I think that if
you dig deep, it's where the,it's where the, the juice, the

(01:10:30):
juju is, it's where the goodstuff is right.
So you go to the depths of yourconscious brain or subconscious
brain to dig for story ideasand you'll find a rich, fertile
ground of, of unique stuff.
That's where play is at itsgreatest, when it's uncon, when
it's unsupervised, unconstructed.
On, just play, I think.

(01:10:51):
I think that's beautiful.
Okay, next one, okay, characterActor Craft Macaroni and cheese
Amy's, Amy's, oh, organic HippieMushrooms.

(01:11:16):
Colorful hippie, uh, mushrooms,colorful, oh, okay, a spectrum
wavy, uh, surfing.
Aquamarine, the john jasonmomoa what?
All right, explain that one.

(01:11:36):
Oh, jason momoa, he playedaquaman.
I like that.
Did you really like?
Did you like aquaman?
Aquaman, that was for me, thatwas an airplane movie.
It was, it was.
It's exactly where I watched itand I love jason Jason Momoa.
I like the first one a lot.
I enjoyed it.
That's the only one I've seen.

(01:11:58):
I didn't see the rest of them.
Yeah, it was great.
I think I'm on longer flightsthan you are, so that's why it
is.
I did meet Jason Momoa at aconvention you did, and we had
an incredible conversation.
He's such a lovely guy and hewas so easy to talk to.
We just riffed for forever, um,and.
But I was taught he's so talland so when I was talking to him

(01:12:19):
, I'm literally like, by the endof our conversation, I finally
like put my head down for thefirst time and I'm like this
massive crick in my neck.
Okay, this triggers somethingfor me.
You've actually been on a showwith robin williams.
Actually been on a show withrobin williams?

(01:12:40):
I have, who is probably to anyimprover or comedian, one of the
greatest all time.
If not, he's great.
He's mozart, yeah, he's mozart.
How was that experience?
I mean, it was transformative.
Um, uh, he what.
You know I for I worked on thecrazy ones, which was the final
show Um, uh, right, right beforehe he passed, and um, I worked

(01:13:02):
on it for four days.
I was like the main villaincharacter to his hero, so we
were like squared off head tohead.
It was really really funepisode.
I got a bunch of scenes withhim, a bunch of scenes with
Sarah Michelle Gellar.
Um, and it was just, he taughtme so much in those four days.
Was he always riffing the wholetime?

(01:13:22):
Well, he was having authenticconversations the whole time.
So there was a lot of timesthat we were standing there
getting rehearsing and we'drehearse our scene and then
typically they'd say, okay,second team on, and so that just
means after we do our clockingrehearsal, usually our like kind

(01:13:43):
of body doubles like secondteam.
It's like people that are sortof the same height and maybe
usually same skin color-ish,because you have to light for us
would step on.
But Robin was like, no, I'llstay.
And I was like, oh, I'll stay.
And I was like, oh, robin'sgonna stay, I'm gonna stay.
Yeah, you're not going anywhere.
Yeah, so me and robin were justlike start chatting about
whatever it is, and he just washe.
He was so, again, he's just soauthentic and you just like talk

(01:14:05):
about he loved comics and youtalk he loved zelda.
So we talked about, like thelegend, neil, all these things,
and so we had all these greatconversations and he knew
everybody's name on set.
He was like thanking everybodyby name, like catching up with
them, and you just notice this,like this real, you know, I
don't know how he was earlier inhis career, but it felt like to
me that you know whether hecame to this or whether he was

(01:14:26):
always this way.
There was this such levelrespect for everyone around him,
for everything that they do,and this this, this feeling
where he just didn't take anounce of it for granted, like he
just he felt like it felt likehe was treasuring it the whole
way.
Um, and he just was so cool,like there's what?
There's this one moment wherewe're uh, me and a bunch of the
other cast were who were likeday players.

(01:14:46):
We're all sitting in a in theroom, in like the break room,
chatting and talking about like,hey, what were the movies that
he was for?
And we were like trying toremember all the movies that he
was nominated for an Oscar for.
And as we were like, we're like, was it this?
Was it that we hear from theback?
We hear from the back like itwas Bicentennial man and it was

(01:15:07):
Robin Williams making fun ofhimself as if Bicentennial man
was the one.
So he was listening to theconversation the whole time and
he just jumps in and it was just.
He was such a delight of ahuman and, yeah, I think just
never taking it for granted wassomething that I really learned
from him.
That's amazing.

(01:15:27):
I think our producer will letus do one more, so Okay, gaming,
gaming.
One more, so okay, um, uh,gaming, uh.
Last of us, I don't know,that's last of us.

(01:15:48):
It's a video game.
Last of us, that's a.
That's a tv show on hbo.
See, I know so little aboutgaming.
Multiplayer game is it amultiplayer game or it's just a
game?
Yeah, I was gonna say mariokart, it's okay, mario kart.
Tortoise, uh, tortoise.
Shell flip uh.
Gymnastics.

(01:16:09):
Pommel horse champion.
Nadia komenich oh, perfect.
10.
Simone biles um, uh, struggles,okay.
Comeback story uh, hoosiers,what are your favorite comeback

(01:16:29):
stories of all time.
I should have said, rudy, I waslike, comeback.
It's like hoosiers was acoosers, a comeback story.
Um, what are your favoritecomeback stories of all time?
I should have said, rudy, I waslike, come back.
It's like hoosiers was acoosiers, a comeback story.
Um, what are your?
I mean, if simone biles, whatare your?
Yeah, simone biles, right, someof us gotta be up there.
Absolutely incredible.
I mean, talk about a chant, talkabout how, uh, someone who man

(01:16:55):
led, led through vulnerability,right, like, yeah, she let it
out there, she let low, yeah, Imean, and the things that were
said about her, uh, afteradmitting that she was having
all these mental health issuesand struggling with being in the
limelight in that way, and thenjust come back and winning it
all.
And winning, I mean like thatis to me what, what a triumph,

(01:17:21):
what, what a way to um, to, to,to demonstrate resilience on the
largest stage imaginable.
That is, that's incredible.
Um and so and so inspiring.
That's awesome.
Yeah, that's awesome.
And so inspiring.
That's awesome.
Yeah, that's awesome.
All right, I'm going to ask youone more question and then

(01:17:44):
we're going to maybe even actlike co-hosts again.
We'll see.
Tell me the second thing thatyou love, Not the first thing,
the second thing you love, notthe first thing, the second
thing, say.
I guess the first thing I wouldsay is being a dad, um, and so
then for the second thing that Ilove, it's performance.

(01:18:05):
Um, specifically, uh, man, doyou love being on stage?
Is that fun for you?
Sweet, sweet taste of theaudience laughing at something
you riffed up at the top of yourhead is is the most like, uh,
dopamine inducing feeling on theplanet, like you just feel

(01:18:29):
you'd, like you said somethingor you let you that you created
something in the moment throughimprov, or even like as you're
in stand-up or whatever, and andthen the audience, it rips
through the audience.
That feeling is is unmatched.
I love that feeling.
It's incredible compared.
So you primarily were improv,more recently did stand up.

(01:18:54):
I love sending your clips topeople, especially your, your,
some of the ones like Swissthick.
I think Indians love that,american, all friends love that.
They think it's hilarious.
Would you, could you pick oneover the other?
Or are they just two differentsides?
Two different kids?
They're two different kids.
They're there, they're just.
They're just two different kids.

(01:19:14):
I two different kids.
They're there, they're just,they're just two different kids.
I mean, I, I, you know, improvis my first love, so it's like I
had to choose, I wouldn't givethat up.
But, um, yeah, there's likeimprov is like more of the team
sport, right, it's like it'smore like playing on on, like on
a volleyball squad squad or abaseball basketball squad or

(01:19:35):
something like that.
That's like when you feel likeyou're in community as you build
this incredible thing andpeople love it, where stand-up
is a little bit more likeprobably gymnastics or something
.
You're up there solo, you'relike all right, I hope I land
this flip perfectly.
I've pointed my toes throughoutand I hope I don't fart.
Oh God, here we go, I'm goingto leotard ready, and so it's

(01:20:00):
very vulnerable and then andthose highs are very, very
different, um, than the, thanthe team highs, you know, but
both wonderful things.
No, this was great.
Um, I know we cooked this oneup because we just haven't had a
chance to do an episode in along time, and I think, you know
, in many ways yeah, in manyways, I think people or those

(01:20:23):
who listen and I've gotten somuch amazing feedback from
people, right, and a lot of themwere like hey, where's that guy
that sounds like you, that,basically, you know, makes all
that geeky stuff interesting andcomes in from another angle and
all that and I was like, well,let's do this one together and
get you back.
So I'm really glad to have youhere.

(01:20:43):
I hope all the buddingentrepreneurs who want to really
dig deep in a go-to-market cutliterally anything out of this
episode.
Wait a minute, this is not allabout go-to-market.
This is about innovation yes,yes, and innovation has
go-to-market.
This is about innovation yes,yes, and innovation has
go-to-market in it, and I thinkthere are many, many lessons
about how to build yourself up,build up a community, how, when

(01:21:07):
there's established mechanismsfor getting something you want
funded, funded, and then there'sunconventional ones, and the
unconventional ones really makeyou you have to go out there in
a way that you probably you'retaking even more chances, right,
and I think that's what'sremarkable.
Let me say this about thoseunconventional ways too, real

(01:21:28):
quick, before we bounce, is that, at least in the way that we
did it with crowdfunding, themajor difference between that
and getting funded by comedycentral and my prior shows stuff
, is that I get to own it all,we get to own the creators get
to own it all and I got to tellyou after having to do it, doing
a 10 year battle to get backthe legend of Neil from comedy

(01:21:49):
central to so that just so Icould put it on YouTube.
That's all I wanted was forpeople to see it and not have it
be buried and lost forever.
You're not even using it.
It's on the shelf.
You're not.
You don't even care about thisproject.
Website is dead.
The website that they have.
I was like I will give youwhatever you want.
You can have all the revenue, Idon't care, I just want people
to see it.
The website's gone.
Like please, let me see, let'ssplit the rep, whatever that I.

(01:22:13):
We don't have to do that fordesi quest.
We don't have to do that forvidya's guy.
We get to be the owners of ourart and that is man.
It may not be, as you know,much money or whatever.
I mean, in some ways it's good,seemingly like it might be, but
, um, you know it's man, there's.
There's nothing like owning,owning your art, that, or owning

(01:22:34):
what you build.
I think in a way it is.
If I were to abstract it to thebusiness world, it is nowadays
how a lot of businesses aregetting themselves funded.
They're out there reaching,they're telling people about who
they are and what they're up to.
They're not necessarily,they're stealth for a little
while, but then they eventuallyput out their technology and
tell people about the journeyand people join in based on that

(01:22:57):
.
So actually, a lot of thedevelopment today is letting the
world know about it and lettingthe world decide upon it.
As you go, people who reallycare will be moved by your
product or service that reallyneed it, like if those are the
ones that are contributing to it.
Oh my God, I mean you see allthis stuff on Kickstarter people
funding their products andstuff like that.
Oh, by the way, just to closethe loop on the, the legend of

(01:23:19):
Neil story took me 10 years toget that back.
You know who?
You know who was the personthat ended up signing the deal
from the business affairs oncomedy central?
It was a guy that because itwas 10 years later who was a kid
watching the legend of neil.
He loved it so much.
He then he then he was like oh,I'm talking to the legend, real
guy.
He goes, I'll get, I'll cut youa deal.

(01:23:40):
That's the only reason why wegot a deal.
It was a fan that got us a dealin the end.
Oh, what a great guy.
That's awesome.
That's that's a great way toclose the loop.
Love your fans, love your fans,so loved your fans.
And you still keep emailingthem.
So that's still out there andthey're still with you and
they're still showing up atevents.
So that's a testament tobuilding great content, great

(01:24:06):
material and a passionatecommunity.
So thanks, sandeep, for joiningus.
So Sandeep usually says theshow is oh, I don't have the
memorize, but yeah, the show isproduced by Anand Shah and me.
Yeah, there you go.
Production assistance by TarynTalley and edited by who's

(01:24:31):
editing it these days?
Sean Maher and Aiden.
Sean Maher and Aiden and Aiden.
Sean Maher and Aiden.
Great, great.
I'm your host, rajiv Parikhfrom Position Squared, an
awesome AI growth marketingcompany based in Silicon Valley,
with all this agentic AI stuffcombined with people.
Come visit us at position2.com.

(01:24:52):
This has been an effing funnyproduction and we'll catch you
next time.
And remember folks, be evercurious.
Be ever curious, I almost saidbe the change you want to be.
All right, cue the music.
Be the change you want to see.

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Bootstrapping a Community Wildfire Response/Sandeep Parikh - Altadena, Crowdfund, EffinFunny ~ Spark of Ages Ep 36

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Bootstrapping a Community Wildfire Response/Sandeep Parikh - Altadena, Crowdfund, EffinFunny ~ Spark of Ages Ep 36