Today we’re excited to be connecting with Paras Borgohain again. If you haven’t already, we suggest you check out our prior conversation with them here.
Paras, we are so thrilled to be connecting again and can’t wait to hear about all the amazing things you have been up to. Before we jump into all of that, some of our readers might have missed our prior interview, so can you take a moment to reintroduce yourself?
I’m a screenwriter for movies and streaming series, among other stuff. In the last two years, I’ve been fortunate enough to land two new opportunities, one of which is writing the screenplay for a major Bollywood movie studio. It’s been quite a ride so far!
Awesome, so we reached out because we wanted to hear all about what you have been up to since we last connected.
It took me a while to gain momentum after the pandemic phase, but it’s nice to be engaged with some interesting screenwriting projects that will no doubt help me grow as a creator. One of them is a part-musical romantic ‘dramedy’ feature produced by a well-established movie studio – some of their work was staple watching for Indian audiences in the 80s and 90s, and that makes it another full-circle moment in my career.
I continue to work on the official feature adaptation of Stan Leventhal’s seminal work, ‘Skydiving on Christopher Street’ (life’s interruptions notwithstanding) and developing my semi-autobiographical limited series, along with a running Youtube series. All of these opportunities have been a good playing field for all the skills I’ve picked up along the way.
Alright, so let’s do something a bit more fast-paced and lighthearted. We call this our lightning round and we’ll ask you a few quick questions.
- Favorite Movie: ‘Magnolia’ by Paul Thomas Anderson
- Favorite Book: Perhaps Jeff Vandermeer’s ‘Annihilation’ from the Southern Reach Trilogy
- Favorite TV Show: Six Feet Under
- Favorite Band or Artist: Broken Social Scene
- Sweet or Savory: Savory
- Mountains or Beach: Mountains
- Favorite Sport (to watch): Watching sport is dull
- Favorite Sport (to play): I like running the best
- Did you play sports growing up (if so which ones): A bit of cricket and football
- As a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up: A movie director
- French Fries or Onion Rings: Fries. Any day
- Chuck Rhodes or Bobby Axelrod: Chuck Rhodes — cause Giamatti!
- Favorite Cartoon growing up: Casper
- Favorite Childhood movie: Jurassic Park. Still down to get swept off
- Favorite Breakfast Food: Eggs in all its forms
Life is often about tough choices – can you talk to us about your thought process, strategy or philosophy when it comes to making difficult choices or tradeoffs.
It’s often tempting to contemplate the “What if”. It’s also hard to accept the cards we’ve been dealt with. I find that the only way to tread around these doubts and frustration is honesty about what you’re in for. If you’re running a business just for capital, then go for broke with those strategies and trash all the faux soul searching, ’cause then you’re left with neither big bucks, nor some kind of deep aspirational fulfillment.
For writers, that’s a constant, because you’re either dealing with other creators supervising you in opinionated or authoritative ways, or dealing with the more privileged funding what you believe in – there are bound to clashes, and the ego is left bruised with doubt and shame. I’d say I’m still not fully eqipped, but the way I’d word my approach lately is perhaps, be mindful of detractors and impediments, but don’t be obsessed with defeating them, or you run the risk of doing dishonest work – the worst kind that you’d hate and so would your audience.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: @theparaspost
