Amidst a flurry of activity, chaos and an unforeseen change of plans, a theatre troupe gets ready for a performance in theatre, film director and actor Akarsh Khurana’s film The Artist(e). And it all takes place in under a minute, its hectic pace and quick shifts of focus an indication of the excitement that ensues backstage before actors appear before the audience. “I always wanted to make a short film about the 15 minutes before a show during which the three bells go off,” says Khurana, who has run theatre company Akvarious Productions for 21 years, and was keen to set his tale in the world he knows so well. “It’s so dramatic as you get closer to the show. It’s like the hour of your reckoning is coming closer. There’s a lot of fun that happens as well. I tried to compress it all into a frenetic one-minute tale.”

Khurana along with filmmakers Nandita Das, Anand Gandhi and Gauri Shinde are part of Instagram’s Cinema Reels: In the making campaign, about discovering a new skillset. On this partnership with Voot, Avinash Pant, Director-Marketing, Facebook India, says, “Our insights show that young people want to express themselves, but feel constrained by personal hesitation and the fear of judgement.” The campaign then is a way to encourage them to explore their identity and celebrate their work-in-progress stories. “Through Cinema Reels, we have credible filmmakers such as Nandita Das and Akarsh Khurana bring alive stories focused on young people, with their own interpretation of expression that is in the making. Each of these stories is presented through a 60-second Reel, and is available to see on their respective Instagram accounts, Voot’s Instagram account, with surrounding content like BTS available on the Voot app.”