Smruti Shinde, producer, SOBO Films, talks to Sangeeta Yadav about Mission Sapne which brings celebrities from all walks of life, living a common man’s life for a day and doing odd jobs to make a difference in their lives. The show goes on air today at 8pm on Colors
What is Mission Sapne all aboutIJ
The show is about celebrities stepping into the shoes of the common man and doing odd jobs to earn a living. The amount earned by the celebrity will be multiplied 100 times by the channel and given to the person whose job the celeb does. Through this show, we want to send a message — one doesn’t have to be a celebrity to make a difference in someone’s life.
Where did the idea come fromIJ
The concept was introduced by the production house three years back and executed on a Marathi channel. This show got lot of viewership and changed many lives. So we decided to do a Hindi version. We hope that people like the concept which is simple yet realistic.
Can you run us through the first episodeIJ
Ranbir Kapoor will be selling vada pav, Mumbai’s staple snack. The actual owner of this kiosk is a man who is saving every penny he can for his daughter’s cancer treatment. You will also see Mika selling tea, Salman Khan cutting hair, Ram Kapoor as a taxi driver, Drashti Dhami as a vegetable vendor, Karan Johar as a photographer in other episodes. In fact, Mika who has sung the title track Sach Hone Ko Hai Sapne didn’t take a fee for it. The shows aims at inspiring people to be philanthropic.
What were the selection criteriaIJ
Our research team went through a list of hawkers, drivers and vegetable vendors who, despite the hardwork, can’t earn enough due to illness or some other unfortunate incident. Every selected candidate is genuine and deserving of the money he will get.
Was it difficult to convince celebrities to come aboard such a projectIJ
The industry always steps in to help whenever called upon to. We wanted to approach celebrities with whom the common man identifies. luckily for us, every celeb we approached said yes and didn’t charge a penny. They loved the concept and rescheduled their work to give us dates.
How did you execute such a novel projectIJ
We had an in-depth discussions with celebrities about the candidate they would help. From getting into the skin of the person to dealing with the public’s emotions and trying to build a connection with them was a tough task for these celebrities. But they managed to overcome the problems. I hope the people like the end product.
Was there need for securityIJ
Nothing that we could not handle or had to call the police for. It had become a little chaotic in Ranbir’s case. We were shooting in Pune on a college campus and the 3,000 youngsters, especially girls, got a wee bit too excited. The situation had got out of control for sometime but we managed to tackle it in the end and no harm came to Ranbir that day.