Amar Kaushik – Hit maker of Bollywood with ‘Stree’ and ‘Bala’ to his credit

Amar Kaushik is a very popular successful director of Bollywood who gave two back-to-back hits – ‘Stree’ and ‘Bala’ in 2018 and 2019 respectively. He joined film industry as an assistant director in year 2008 and turned a full-fledged film director with horror comedy movie, Stree in 2018. In 2019 he directed his second film, ‘Bala’, and with the success of both these flicks, he established his career in Bollywood. He has also directed the web series, Table No.5 in 2018 and one short film “Aaba” before he turned a Bollywood director.

Amar Kaushik was born in 1983 in Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh. His father is a retired forest ranger at Indian Forest Service, and his mother is a retired school teacher. Till the age of 10, he spent days in North-east, Medo of Arunachal Pradesh where his father was employed. Later he continued his studies at Kanpur (where his grandparents lived) and also Delhi. After graduating in Mass Communication in Delhi he moved to Mumbai in 2006. He joined as an assistant director of debutant director Raj Kumar Gupta for the movie, Aamir, and for the next 10 years he worked as an assistant and associate director under different filmmakers, and also produced a couple of short films – “Dry Dreams” and “Fuddu Boys“.

Apart from film director Raj Kumar Gupta he has also worked under Onir, Mrighdeep Singh Lamba, Raj and D.K. and Majid Majidi for movies such as Go Goa Gone, Fukrey, Beyond the Clouds, Shad etc. His debut movie as a director Stree got noticed for the fresh treatment for a horror comedy and was a surprise hit. He continued his successful journey with ‘Bala’ which told about the baldness and the stigma associated with it. He is now working on the sequel to Stree as well as a movie based on surrogacy.

Amar Kaushik – Some interesting and less-known facts

1. During childhood days he mostly watched Bollywood potboilers. He started watching international films with Children’s of Heaven at the age of 12.

2. His movie Stree bagged him Best Debutant Director award at Filmfare awards and a nomination for best director. He was also nominated for best director at Star Screen Awards.

3. His debut short film Aaba bagged the Special Jury Prize at the Berlin International Festival 2017. It was the only Award-Winning Indian Short Film at the International Festival. It was shot in the backdrop of Arunachal Pradesh, where Amar spent his life till he turned 10 years.

4. His debut short film Aaba was funded by film director Raj Kumar Gupta, under whom he worked for projects like Aamir and No One Killed Jessica. The film was showcased at Toronto International Film Festival in 2017 too.

5. He grew up listening to the interesting stories told by his mother, which influenced him a lot in storytelling. He used to be a good listener during his childhood days.

6. He has also faced problems and bad experiences because of early baldness, and it helped him to give a realistic feel to his movie, Bala. Niren Bhatt and Pavel Bhattacharjee were behind the story of the movie. When no movie maker was willing to direct this film, Amar Kaushik decided to take up the project.

7. He is married to Nalini Neha from Bhagalpur since 2008. It was exactly the same year when he joined Bollywood industry as an assistant director. His mother-in-law, Vijaya Mohini runs a private school in Bhagalpur.