Daily Inspiration: Meet Manoj Chandra

Hi Manoj, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I was born and raised in a coastal city in India called Vizag. I had a beautiful childhood. Most of my childhood was around films. Everyone from Vizag are passionate about films. I think there’s an unknown mystery to the city. Films were appreciated all over India, but people from Vizag preach films. I grew up witnessing fan wars in the cinemas, well-dressed people stealing movie tickets for the premiere show, people dancing, crying, and celebrating their favorite actors in a premiere show. Unconsciously I developed an immense love for cinema at a very small age. I still remember when I was in my 2nd grade of school, I troubled my dad to take me to “Hritik Roshan’s” first film, “Kaho Na Pyar hai.” He had to take a day off at work to do that for me. My passion for films grew even more while I was a teenager, and it started to panic my parents. They had to restrict me from my TV time since I would spend all evening watching films. I used to save up. Lie and secretly go to the cinemas to watch films. I also used to hide my rented DVDs in my books and wait for everyone to sleep so I could watch movies in my room.

As a teenage kid, I’ve only dreamt of being an actor but never imagined it to be actually happening. Since the city I was from wasn’t a market for film productions, I’ve never even had an opportunity to witness a film production during my childhood. Just when I was about to enter my high school, we had six months of time to make a career choice and enter college. I came across an audition in my city, “Vizag”. With no acting experience or film set experience, I have applied with the selfies I took on my mom’s phone. The production invited me for an audition and sent me a script. With days of sleepless nights and practice, I made it to the audition. After days of waiting, they reverted to me with a principal role in the film. Being my first feature film at the age of 17, the film was a learning experience for me. The film didn’t do well at the Box office, and that dint stops me from taking the leap of faith in films. My passion for cinema was even bigger than that. Though the film didn’t take me anywhere, it made my parents believe in my passion, and they let me study in a college which was in “Hyderabad.” A hub for regional film productions.

I spent the first few months in college getting used to the city and making new friends. One of my friends in college who was passionate about cinematography approached me, asking if I would act in his short film. I immediately jumped on the opportunity. The film was an indie short film, shot in the local bus station in under an hour. The film made it to multiple film fests, and that lead to more indie directors approach me to act in their short films. As much as I was busy with short films, I wanted to occupy myself with something bigger. Movies weren’t the option at that time since I had to attend college all day. I approached multiple TV channels and Radio stations for VJ/RJ positions. Though most of them dint even care to take an audition, I didn’t give up. I walked into the biggest TV channel at that time called “Maa TV.” With the experience of getting shooed away by the security itself, I had to pose as an actor who was actually consulted by someone in the TV channel. Though I didn’t look the part as an actor, the security dint wants to mess and get into trouble. So they ended up checking with their boss, and they let me in. The Boss takes a look at me and asks me what talents can I impose.

I started to rap a regional song I wrote back in the day. He was impressed. He ended up putting me to one of his associates who auditioned me the very same day and hired me as a Host for a celebrity chat show. I interviewed over 40+ Indian film stars during the course of college—post-college, I wanted to be a director. Since I was in the TV industry, I was inspired by American Crime shows, and I developed my own concept show for a news channel and made a demo for under 30 USD, which I borrowed from my dad. After multiple obstacles, I made a solid demo that captured a TV channel’s interest with dreams of getting out of college and turning into a crime show director at the age of 21, living independently in Hyderabad. I was all set to venture out to a new phase of my life. Though I had no plans of working in the IT industry, my mates in college made me attend a campus job interview drive. With full confidence of not being able to being selected, I casually took the interview, that day changed the course of my life.
I made through the interviews and was selected as a Software Associate in a reputed IT company.

Many of my friends whom I thought would deserve to be in the job couldn’t make it. As much as I was happy for myself, I knew it inside my heart that I wouldn’t be taking the IT job since I plan to take off as a director. Few days passed, and the political situation in my state had changed. There was a separation in the state. The state was divided into two. The TV channel which was interested in my show received hate from the newly formed local government since they dint support the separation during their fight. This led to multiple cases filed against the TV channel, and they were also banned from being telecasted in the newly formed state. This took a toll on the TV channel from being experimenting with New TV shows and my offer was pulled back. Eventually, I had to take up the IT job, which moved me to a different city which was more of an industrial city and a non-film production city. I had no way to go back to the film industry, but I was unhappy and unsatisfied with my job, which was making me money, but it was pushing me away from my dreams.

Around the time, I was still part of the same social network where I would get audition calls. Though none of the projects were actually legit, I would still submit since that was my only route. I came across a casting call posted by an indie filmmaker and I casually submitted my materials with over 1000 people submitting for eight roles. I was shortlisted for the leading role in the film. The director invited me for a callback, for which I had to travel to Hyderabad and live in a friend’s place and attend the callback. With no idea of how I would manage my job if selected, I attended the callback but never received a contract or call from the film production after that.I saw them post about still auditioning for the role they offered me. In my memory, the director seemed very impressed during the callback, and it didn’t make any sense to me why they dint reach back to me. I felt reaching back to him would be unprofessional, but I had nothing to lose. I left a text to the director asking if he was unhappy with my performance, and I wanted feedback and not anything else. He immediately calls me back, stating he was absolutely sold with my performance and he was only concerned about me traveling back and forth while having an IT job in a different city. I told him I would have to work with my manager at that time and get back to him.

During my tenure in the IT company until that point, I had multiple instances where my manager would ask me in a meeting if I ever considered being an actor. A lot of my other colleagues did tell him that I was an actor before getting in the IT company. Turns out it was my manager’s dream to be an actor and for him to see me struggle in an IT company while I was dreaming to be an actor was very personal. The very same day after having the conversation with the director, I walked into my manager’s cabin and explained him my situation. He asked me what is stopping me from doing this dream project of mine. I told him I’m worried about balancing the job. He immediately said he would take care of it for me and asked me to follow my dreams. My manager’s name is Shyam, and I’m forever grateful for him in believing me, I ventured out for a month-long mountaineering training for the film since it was based on mountaineering, The film required us to perform own stunts and this was very challenging for me since I was always scared of heights. But this film was a do-or-die film for me as an actor. If I give up, I might never have a chance to be an actor again; therefore, I put in everything I could into the film.

After a year of filming and also balancing an IT job and traveling between two cities on changing shooting schedules, Almost living a double life, I finally managed to finish filming for the film in under a year. Since it was an indie film with a tight budget, the film ran out of cash for post-production. The producer pulled out money from his own savings and ended up working 0ut on the post-production for over a year, and this was the waiting period that was testing all my patience. After waiting another year, the film ran into release issues. We couldn’t find a distributor who was willing to trust an indie film with an experimental concept around mountaineering. The pressure kept growing as its officially been three years since the movie started, and as an actor, I was losing myself in the IT industry, not knowing where my career was being led to. Within those two years of post-production, I even completed a master’s degree in Data Science from the International Institute of Information Technology.

At this point of my life, I was very confused between my careers. Eventually, I started to digest the fact that the film might never get released. Being hopeless as an actor, I started to write and direct webseries for Youtube channels while I was working in the IT job. One day while I was at work, one of my close friends “Teja Nemani” texted me asking me “Where’s the party at?” and he sends me a screenshot. The screenshot was a snippet of a Tweet by a legendary director “SS Rajamouli” from India, where he was praising the film’s trailer and he shared it on his Twitter wall. “SS Rajamouli” is the “Quentin Tarantino” of Indian cinema. There was our film could get recognition from a man like him, so I thought this was a fan account of “SS Rajamouli”. But I did see the blue tick beside the Twitter handle. This freaked me out, I immediately checked his Twitter and I can’t describe the emotions I went through in that very second. I wanted to stand up and scream in happiness, but I was in the office. It turns out the film’s trailer went viral immediately as he shared it and everyone in the had their eyes on the film that day. I immediately stopped working and took the day off.

The very same day, we had another director, “RGV,” speaking about the film on social media, and everything changed that day. We had distributors offering us deals starting the very same day. The film is called “Sanjeevani: An adventure on the edge,” till date, it has 40 Million digital views. I was called in for another film even before Sanjeevani had released since the distributor shows had directors who wanted to cast me. I played a principal role in a film called “PaperBoy”. This was a huge budget commercial film which released the month after Sanjeevani and it took me on a roll. I was called in by multiple productions after that, and I played a principal role in a series which is an Indian remake of “Baker and the Beauty”. The series is yet to be released on a major streaming platform.

When the Pandemic hit, I decided to move to the United States and persue film all over again, I had moved to Houston in between the Pandemic After i moved to the states i started making use of the pandemic as an opportunity and I had started to write and develop screenplays over time. I worked on myself getting familiar with American Films & TV. I even started taking Acting classes to understand the Hollywood style of acting. I worked on my accent reduction and made a lot of friends here in Houston. Eventually, I started to Act, Write, and Direct. I was making my side cash through a freelance website called “Fiverr,” where I was ghostwriting screenplays for multiple directors all over the world. Eventually, I gained traction and started to write better, and I was able to get better at writing my own scripts. As I pitched my scripts to multiple producers, I gained more interest from them which made me start directing short films and commercials. Larica Urbina, a well-known photographer from Houston, was looking for a cinematographer, and I connected with her.

Our first project together was a fashion BTS which also turned out to be a good commercial. I started to direct my own short films at home. All the while I was doing this, I was making sure I was submitting myself to acting roles around Texas. But one trip to Miami made me fall in love with the city wanting me to work on a film project there. I immediately joined Miami film groups on Facebook. I was submitting myself to everything I would come across in the groups. One day I came across a casting call for a film that was going to be streamed on Netflix, and it turns out the film had an Indian role which was very unusual. I immediately submitted and received a call back within a few days. I attended the callback. At that point, I had no idea whom I was talking to. It turns out the director, actor, and producer for the film are the biggest superstars of Africa who made record-breaking films. Though I was supposed to be performing a scene from the film in the callback. They didn’t want me to audition since they thought that it would be disrespectful for an experienced actor to audition, and thats the impression they got looking at my demo reel, which had acting clips of mine from all my films. This was the moment of my life I was desperately waiting for someone to recognize my talent and hard work. I had no clue about their backgrounds, but I was down to work with them for the respect they gave me.

In a couple of weeks, I was flown down to Miami filming for this huge project called “Christmas in Miami.” Christmas in Miami is the fourth installment of the AKPOS film series created by renowned Nigerian comedian AYO MAKUN popularly known as ‘AY’. Following on from his rib-cracking and havoc wrecking adventures in 30 DAYS IN ATLANTA, A TRIP TO JAMAICA and TEN DAYS IN SUNCITY, this time Akpos jets off with his family to the exotic city of Miami, Florida to represent Nigeria at the Intercontinental Christmas Fiesta, which is a unifying Fiesta that will bring together six families from six very diverse nations across five continents, to spend the week leading up to Christmas together, on an exotic island in Miami, USA. The movie is a multi starred with actors like “Ayo Makun”, “Rafe-Damijo”, “Osita” and also the legendary actor “John Amos”. This film is going to be the biggest film in Africa this year, and we are awaiting its release this Christmas in both cinemas and Netflix. I play the interesting role of “Roy Patel,” a typical Indian guy who comes to America in hopes of winning a reality TV show.

The film ended up being 2021’s highest grossing film in Africa.

Apart from Christmas in Miami I had also worked on another film called “Men in Blue” which is now on the film festival circuit. With my experience in the motion picture business, this film is the most meaningful project for me. The film revolves around a group of immigrant shipyard workers who are put together in a highly controlled industrial camp, the film speaks about humanity and labor rights like never before, I play the lead character “Rafiq Ali” in the film, the character had so much depth to him. The world of Men in Blue is very dark and thought-provoking that it had some after-effects on my mental health after the film was done shooting. Kudos to the National award winning filmmaker “Sachin Dheeraj” who onboarded me for the role of Ali after several rounds of auditions. Interestingly background goes back to a coastal city of India called Vizag. Ali hails from the same city I was born and raised, this situation sort of let me easily fill the shoes of the character in terms of the slang, dialect and behaviour of the character.

I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
It wasnt a smooth road at all, and I dont expect a smooth road is coming forward as well, and I’m ready for it. The industry I work in takes a lot of emotional stress. The uncertainty is something that keeps me both excited and also puts me down in certain times. But I strongly believe in Rocky Balboa’s quote, it’s not how many knockdowns which define us, it’s when you get back up and fight again. Every time I fought back, I was rewarded with something bigger in life, and I would suggest anyone whos about to give up on their dreams to keep fighting until they get what they want. Our life is not worth giving up.

I did face criticism back in the day when I was doing the TV show in college. Friends in college used to bully me. I used to get in my head around that time since I was very young. But eventually, I was glad at least they are watching my show. I still get criticized about the projects I have done in the early stages of my career, and I think it’s okay. I put myself out there for people to judge me. The key is I dont let either positive or negative feedback affect me in any way. I still try to work along the same way how I was working for my first film regardless of where I stand in my career. Films are my life and I the struggles which i face along my career are also some things I cherish along with success.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I’m an actor, writer, director. I’m proud of my abilities in not giving up on my childhood dreams and building a career in the industry I have always dreamt of. Apart from others, I’m not a regular Actor, Writer, Director who chose this path during my high school. The love for cinema is what keeps me going in life, and to do something you love every day and getting paid for it is the best feeling ever for a human being.

Can you share something surprising about yourself?
I’m also a traveler. I have solo traveled across Southeast Asia in the last few years. I have been to countries like Vietnam, Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Tanzania, Switzerland. I did solo cross-country bike tours across these countries, and I have an immense love for travel. The reason I have traveled solo is that I dont think anyone can match my level of craziness while I travel. I travel with no plans, and they usually turn out to be the best. I randomly decided to do my Scuba diving certification in Bali while I was on a solo trip.