The most difficult part honestly has been casting so far we had 5 actors change continously till the day of the shoot.
The members are as followed:
Khadeeja Faisal as “Laila”
Muhammad Shehwaiz as “Hassan”
Fatima Tul Zahra as “Young Laila”
Saim Usman as “Young Hassan”
Muzammil Godil as “Chacha”
Essa Safdar as “Ali”
Our very first actor turned out to be someone not exactly good to our work and reputation (what are the odds?) After a lot of calls to other college acquaintances we finally got a male lead. unfortunately, he called at 2am telling us he can’t make it so now, we were kinda stuck. We already prepared each and everything before the shoot, we couldn’t let single problem ruin our entire day. So we decided to ask our mutuals to help us out and thankfully they showed up last minute.
The most stressful part of casting were the kids. Now, i love kids, meeting them and watching their eyes glow with excitement at the thought of being on screen was definitely something one deserves to witness. These kids were Mirab’s cousins, we got a legal document signed by the parents allowing them to be a part of the project. However, the issue was getting them to act and for once, not look directly at the camera. Out of 50 shots we finalized 5…. Buttt the kids fit perfectly with their adults version, they all looked alike and of course we had to capture it.
The kids were really happy, the picture was just captured at the wrong time (trust me).
Saim is 9 years old and was really happy to have skipped school for the shoot. He was actually our very first cast member on board. Fatima is 6 and I first met her on video call to approve the character look alike since, we already had an appearance in mind for young Laila. safe to say, she was flawless and to top it off brought her own snacks. We made sure they were comfortable and having fun.
Moving on to the adults. Shehwaiz seemed like the perfect fit for the male lead since firstly, he looked a lot like Saim. Secondly, he had previous experience of doing shoots since he was the drama society president and resigned in february. Khadeeja faisal (Our female lead) was definitely our proudest decision. In our recent play, she secured the lead so we wanted to incorporate her talent now, on film.
Moving on to the Chacha, which was played by Muzammil Godil. He is currently a science med student and has a distinguished talent and gift of theatre. We dry shampoo-ed his hair white for the character and he pulled it off.
Essa was someone we had previously shot with and he never fails to keep us entertained. He was our initial male lead but we conducted a few screen tests and decided to go for Shehwaiz. He was willing to help us out however, so we gave him his role as “Ali”.
The entire cast had great chemistry so the shoot seemed less stressful and they didn’t have a problem with the million takes and extreme detailing.
That’s all for now, Folks!
Despair For Dummies 
Leave a comment