Tanmaya Shekhar’s directorial debut Nukkad Naatak, now streaming on Netflix India, underlines two virtues — patience and grassroots work. That’s exactly what it took him, his producing partner and lead actor Molshri, and their team to get their film released even though it was lying ready for months. In an exclusive interview with SCREEN, they open up on getting their indie to theatres despite lack of access and relying on their viral Instagram campaign ‘How To Enter Bollywood’ and a pan-India caravan tour for marketing.Your film remained unreleased for one and a half years after it was complete. A lot of indie films, like Stolen and Dug Dug, assembled its Avengers — a host of big names from the film industry — to back the project as Executive Producers. Did you not try going for this model?Tanmaya: Yes, that’s the trend these days. We also wanted that, but we didn’t have any idea whatsoever about how to release a film or the business of it. It’s not like any potential presenter watched the film and said they’re not keen. We couldn’t even get there. Access was a major issue.Imtiaz Ali has promoted Nukkad Naatak with you on Instagram. How did you get access to him?Tanmaya: We’d try visit the offices of all producers. But of course, the guards wouldn’t let us enter. One day, we were chatting with the guard outside, and Imtiaz sir’s car was entering at the same time. We started giving him the elevator pitch right there. He looked very confused, wondering who are these two people, wearing black kurtas and red chunnis. But we handed him a letter we used to carry everywhere. He read the letter and DMed Molshri on Instagram a couple of days later. He called us to office one day, watched the film, and really liked it. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Molshri (@molshriii)//www.instagram.com/embed.jsDid the recent indie wave, which started with Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine As Light, help you secure a release?Tanmaya: When I got to know Humans in the Loop would release on Netflix India, that was a huge motivation for me. Because All We Imagine As Light won an award at the Cannes Film Festival. Sabar Bonda and Girls Will Be Girls won at Sundance Film Festival. They’re huge A-list festivals. Our film didn’t get selected at any such festival. So, we didn’t compare us to them. Humans in the Loop was the big success story of 2025 for me. They also did a lot of community screenings. We did something different, but we were inspired by them to pick a strategy and follow it through passionately.Story continues below this adYour strategy was the Instagram micro-series ‘How To Enter Bollywood’. The episode where you try to gatecrash the Yash Raj Films office blew up quite a bit. Did that actually happen?Tanmaya: No, we didn’t even try entering the YRF office because it’s like a fortress. We spent 99% of our time just trying to woo the guards. And it’s not like we’re asking for work. We have a film ready, we just want you to see it. But even when we faced a rejection or a negative encounter, we’d think we can turn it into an episode. That was very empowering.Molshri: But this was an endless cycle of visiting production houses only to be told by the guards that you can’t enter without knowing them. But how do you get to know them if you can’t even visit them? Some of them wouldn’t even take our resumes. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Molshri (@molshriii)//www.instagram.com/embed.jsIs entering Bollywood really this much of an uphill climb for outsiders?Story continues below this adTanmaya: Definitely. At the end of the day, the film industry is very small. The number of people who work in the film industry across the country would be what, around 20,000? That’s such a small number. Ten thousand people work in one office on Facebook alone. So, how do you even get to the decision makers? They’re rich and famous. Their numbers and email IDs aren’t publicly listed. No casting audition is advertised with specific details on LinkedIn. The government also doesn’t help you.How much did it cost to release the film independently?Tanmaya: We’d already paid Rs 10 lakh to the distributor. But there were hidden costs of Rs 70 lakh involved — Rs 1.40 lakh for the CBFC application process (Rs 75,000 application fees + Rs 15000 screening cost + Rs 50,000 agent fees), Rs 5 lakh for mastering of DCP in four different formats, and VPF (virtual print fees) of Rs 16,000 per show. It had 40 shows a day, with only one show in every theatre. But the tickets in Mumbai were very expensive, from Rs 350 to Rs 400. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Molshri (@molshriii)//www.instagram.com/embed.jsHow long did it stay in theatres?Our biggest fear was that it’d get wiped out of theatres in three days. Our film released with The Kerala Story 2 and maybe the exhibitors would get a mandate by the bigger producers to play their films instead. But it stayed for three weeks. We were very sure that it’d be out in that time because Dhurandhar 2 was releasing on March 19. Even Toxic was releasing till that point.Story continues below this adHow much did it end up earning at the box office?Molshri: Rs 20 lakh. Obviously, we only got half of that. It was a joke! It didn’t even cover our distribution costs.Also Read — The story of India’s first Rs 1 crore fee: When KC Bokadia insisted on paying Amitabh Bachchan more than he askedYour Instagram campaign has a wide reach, but was it disappointing that not many of them showed up to watch the film in theatres?Story continues below this adMolshri: Of course, it was. The way we marketed the film, we assumed that as soon as the booking starts, the shows would go houseful immediately. We thought of partying when that happens, but that party never happened (laughs).Tanmaya: There’s also a systemic problem. We’re very small, so the exhibitors didn’t listen to us. Like it happens for live events like comedy or music, the booking opens a month in advance. That would’ve been ideal for us to spread the word accordingly. Nukkad Naatak has a similar, small but passionate following. But the exhibitors told us that never happens. The booking for films opens only in the last week. But it’s happened for Ek Din now because that’s backed by Aamir Khan Productions.