Step 2: Networking
Within weeks, with the help of the casting boys, I had met some of Bollywood's biggest stars. I shook hands and got the phone number of the sexiest of all, an unlikely looking man with a big nose and shaggy hair named Shahrukh Khan. Most Americans have no idea who Shahrukh is. But mention his name to your female Indian, Pakistani or otherwise South Asian co-worker in the next cubicle and listen for the thud as she faints away. As hundreds of young Indian men pressed against the fence around the set of Shahrukh's new Pepsi commercial, I sat within a couple of chairs of the man, a "friend of the crew."

Indian actors seemed to like us foreign extras. Maybe they saw us as a break from the gawkers, assuming we didn't know them from the key grip. Usually, we didn't. "I thought he was the horse trainer or something," one foreigner said, after I pointed out India's most respected actor, the Oscar-nominated (for producing "Lagaan") Aamir Khan.

I found complete unconcern on the set for who I was and what I did. I could play with the on-set elephant or eavesdrop on actors complaining about Bollywood's gay casting couch. Being foreign and assumed ignorant, I was harmless.

That appearance opened many doors. Without really trying, I not only met stars but became a casting agent, a dancer, a pitch-making screenwriter, a documentary assistant and an aspiring film journalist, all in less than four months. That someone like me cared about Indian films was novelty enough to win one shot at anything.

I walked the beaches of Goa, handing out casting cards to pretty girls. I watched a real-life Bollywood diva, a top film critic, show off for me by abusing her young male employees, and I had Subhash Ghai's screenwriters nodding at my movie pitch (a crossover film for Shahrukh Khan) and suggesting that I add a goofy gay character. It started to feel a little Hollywood to me.

But I hadn't yet stepped in front of the lights.

Step 3: Exposure
The usual role for a non-Indian woman in Bollywood involves bouncing in the background of a nightclub scene, or posing as a stewardess. I did both. But last season's film shoots offered changing roles.

I became a ballroom dancer in a period film called "The Rising," with an Indian-British cast. Excited and wanting to stay on set, I led a small mutiny of women so we could also play soldiers, mustaches and all. A friend from Texas, as Caucasian as they come, even talked his way into a speaking role. On the easygoing set, he took the star, Aamir Khan, aside and taught him to play the bugle.

At the end of my shoot for "The Rising," I was offered a job as an assistant director, based on nothing but my enthusiasm and the fact that I showed up every day. Unfortunately, the producer's daughter was the only person in Mumbai who cared about my background, and when she heard I was a writer she kicked me off set. I sulked.

But then, a casting boy offered the stunt job. They needed a blonde, he said.

At its bottom fringe, and possibly higher, the Indian film industry doesn't bother with contracts, insurance or even film credits. I knew this and said yes, knowing I'd get none of the above, and hoped it wouldn't get dangerous.

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