“Attempting to get at truth means rejecting stereotypes and cliches.” – Harold Evans

Stereotypes exist for all races across the board. Some of them can be true while others are blatantly false. Nearly all of them can be associated with ignorance.

Yes, some cab drivers are brown.

Yes, a lot of IT guys are also brown.

Yes, even many terrorists have brown skin.

As it turns out though, there are brown people around the world who also happen to be athletes, artists, writers, actors, teachers, pilots, directors, editors, journalists, bartenders, painters, comedians, zookeepers, train conductors, lawyers, politicians, construction workers, cops, personal trainers and much more.

But a lot of people don’t get exposed to this form of thinking. It’s not completely their fault either. Most South Asian actors in Hollywood don’t get to portray the above roles listed. Why? Well because it seems convention and stereotypes have them playing the occasional cab driver, terrorist, IT guy or doctor most of the time. Don’t get me wrong though. There are plenty of exceptions to this rule. But until they stop being exceptions, it’s still going to be an issue.

The short film “…Or Die”, directed by Gregory Bonsignore and John Petaja, satirizes the obstacles today’s South Asian Hollywood actors have to deal with. It premiered at the South Asian International Film Festival (SAIFF) this past weekend and starred pretty much every brown person you’ve seen on television including Parvesh Cheena, Rizwan Manji, Guru Singh, Sonal Shah and too many others to list here (including some classic cameos).

It was one of those rare films that’s hilarious, sad and thought-provoking all at once. If you’re bored of reading this already, I’ll make the bottom line absolutely clear before your attention veers away towards a meme of a cat trapped in a pumpkin or something. This is the best and most important film I’ve seen at SAIFF till now. It hits on every issue I’ve ever noticed with the way South Asians are portrayed in Hollywood.

The story centers around three South Asian actors who pitch several ideas for some comedy shorts to a production studio. However, instead of funding those ideas, the studio wants to film their own stuff involving terrorists and cab drivers. So rather than working with the racially inept production executives, the actors make their own video parodying all the stereotypes (complete with a really hilarious Bollywood dance sequence). But the video goes viral and becomes successful for all the wrong reasons.

After the movie was shown, director Gregory Bonsignore explained the groups’ motivation for making the film. As it turns out, the first scene involving the pitch meeting was not fiction.

“The first act actually happened. We met with ‘Funny or Die’ and that entire sequence really happened almost word for word,” Bonsignore said. “We were like, well we could just feel terrible about ourselves or we could make this film and make you all feel terrible about it.”

And while he was joking (sort of), that was what ended up happening. The film is funny, but if you take it the way I think the filmmakers want you to take it, you should be a little uncomfortable laughing. I mean there is a reason the “Funny” from “Funny or die” is taken out of the title.

The movie works on so many levels. After the video gets huge success, Parvesh Cheena’s character gets a call from a studio for a new role. Unfortunately, the role is for a gay terrorist. Noticeably disappointed, he looks back at his girlfriend (Sonal Shah) for comfort. All she can say to cheer him up is “Well, it’s work.”

And there it is. The cycle continues because these guys need to take what they can get. But making a movie like this is a fantastic step in the right direction. I think the filmmakers realized that change would never take place in the industry without any impetus.

I don’t know if this film will break any barriers and pave the way for all South Asian actors in the future. But I’m 100 percent positive that doing nothing was certainly not going to change anything. At the very least, I think it’ll make some noise. Hopefully with the right recognition, studios and executives might realize what brown can actually do for them.

On that note, I leave you with the song from the movie’s credits called “One Moment in Bollywood.”