Hollywood has not at all times been very inclusive of Indians of their midst and whereas the bottom actuality is likely to be slowly altering now, with actors like Priyanka Chopra, issues weren’t the identical nearly a decade in the past when AR Rahman was actively working within the West. In a current chat on The Good Time Present’s YouTube channel, Rahman recalled many cases the place he was the one brown individual within the room.
The musician was speaking about his publicity in Hollywood after he received the Oscar for Slumdog Millionaire. “The doors that opened were… everyone knows me in Hollywood even if I don’t know them. I was the only brown guy I think,” he stated.
Rahman recalled that after he received the Oscar, and was part of the Academy, he would usually get invited for events. “Because I’m a member of the Academy, I’ll get all those invitations. Spielberg invites you, JJ Abrams invites you, Disney invites you so I went for everything,” he stated. Rahman shared that by no means had the time to attend any events earlier than this however whereas he was in Los Angeles, he made certain to stay the expertise to the fullest. “So all the stuff I never did. I went and met people, and even though I would not stay there much, I would just stay for 10-15 minutes, because of loud music and people drinking and claustrophobia. So I will just say hey… (and leave),” he recalled.
However the one incident that stood out in his reminiscence was when he was attending a celebration by Disney for his or her 2013 movie Frozen. Rahman recalled that across the similar time, it was the ninetieth start anniversary of Walt Disney. “I remember going to the Disney party and I was doing Million Dollar Arm (at the time) so they invited me for Frozen (party). It was also the 90th birthday of Walt Disney so there was a statue of him. So I was taking a selfie (with the statue), I look back and 100 people were looking at me. I was the only brown person there,” he stated.
Rahman famously received the Greatest Unique Rating and Greatest Unique Tune for his work in Slumdog Millionaire in 2009.
