All about the beginning
It was only, when Vipul was in class 3, he got introduced to Shri Manorama Desai. Manorama had a dance, music and theatre school, in which Vipul at such a small age received a chance to portray the character of a Maharaja. At such a small age he liked the story, understood the script and to everyone’s surprise he acted so well there, that he received a silver medal as an award. It was then that he thought of pursuing his career in it and started dreaming about fulfilling it.
His dreams for the Silver Screen
It was then when he started participating in school events to polish his skills. He used to visualised his own name, whenever he found any advertisements of theatre/films or skits on any newspaper. He always had one vision- how to fulfill his dream of having a career in entertainment industry.
He enrolled his name for the child drama (Baal Natak) after passing 10th standard. He slowly got recognition, after he played parts in two dramas. Shree Chandravadan Bhatt- a big name in theatre spotted him from those two dramas, and offered him a backstage job in one of his plays- ‘Saga Sahu Swarthna.’ While he was doing the backstage work for the play ‘Masiba’, he got introduced to Shree Vijay Dutt and Shree Mukta Dutt, who inspired Vipul to join Drama Academy.
His passion for theatre remains in heart forever
In spite of being a science student, he used to give more time for his tasks related to theatres. Six months of his initial days in class 12, he spent practicing Drama, and when suddenly he went to Chemistry lab, his teacher was confused and asked if he was a Science student? He has written the screenplay and songs of ‘Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak’ on his Physics exam paper, and when his teachers found that they called his parents, and his mother thrashed him with a badminton bat.
How did he get recognition!
With time everyone was noticing Vipul Mehta and how good he was in Theatre. It was then when Miss Minakshi Rathod from Maniben Nanavati College met him and asked him to direct a drama for Girls college competition. Thus, how he started his directorial career with internal college drama for competition. His first drama for girl’s college was ‘Sparsh’ which gave him a good recognition. For this drama he received the best director award in the competition. He had teary eyes when someone was looking for him and said ‘Where is the director who touched everyone’s heart.’
He has even written and directed a Play for the girl’s college competition where the girls played the character of boys. He has two very popular Gujrati Dramas as well in his direction basket. Renowned personality like Shree Shailesh Dave liked Vipul personally a lot, and he came specially to see his direction and delayed his own task. He was literally overjoyed and nervous when a very famous director came to him and said ‘I am going to copy your direction style.’
The best recognition he received was in 1995, during the silver jubilee of the college competition, when the girls received the best male actor’s awards for his play. From 1995 2000 he directed the zonal and national level drama competition for Mumbai University, and it was during that tenure the University received Golden Award for Drama. During that time Vipul Mehta’s direction recognised as must watched drama by all.
But success doesn’t come alone. Failure also comes to show you the rough path in life. In the year 1995, 1997 and 1998, he directed three dramas with very good actors, but unfortunately all of them flopped. He learnt his mistakes from his failure. ‘Jalsa Karo Ne Jayantilal’ is a very popular and well appreciated drama directed by Vipul which was a big hit. Mr. Sanjay Goradia watched this play and came to him for buying the copyrights of it. It was not just that, but he also offered Vipul to direct it in a professional way with some of the biggest names of the theatre. That was Vipul’s turning point.
He fought against obstacles
Unfortunately, his mother left for her heavenly abode in 1998 just a year after he got married. For him, his family especially his parents are his greatest support. When everyone was against his wish of pursuing his career in the field of theatre, it was only his parents who have supported him.
His introduction to the television industry
He was introduced to Ekta Kapoor, by one of his good contacts. Ekta wanted to see some of his writing, and she was extremely talented when she saw it. She gave Vipul a small task to write a pilot episode for ‘Kashish Ek Asha’ to be directed by Anurag Basu. Though his first draft was not approved by Ekta, and she asked him to rework on that. He tried and tried, and then Ekta approved it. It started with Tamil & Telugu and was first aired on 7th March 2000 on Zee.
During that time Ekta was working on ‘Kyunki Saans Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi.’ It was one evening when Jitendra ji and Shobha Kapoor were not there in office, and Ekta was working. Vipul went to her and narrated her a script of the project that he has written. Ekta was so impressed that she called Jitendra ji and Shobha ji back to office for a narration.
Along with all these, he was meeting Mr. Sanjay Goradia frequently to complete the pending job for directing ‘Jalsa Karo Ne Jayantilal’. Finally, after 2000’s Diwali they started working on it. It was first released on 26th January, 2001 and they did 250 shows globally.
Till date Vipul has directed 92-95 dramas. He has worked with famous actors and big and respected names like Shree Sarita Joshi, Shree Arvind Joshi, Shree Ketki Dave and also with famous and talented artists like Sharman Joshi, Mansi Joshi, Riddhi Dave and many more.
He always wanted to work with Siddharth Randeria, where other than comedy it will be an emotional role. He fulfilled that dream when he directed ‘Chal Jivi Laie.’ He has written many serials for the renowned name of the Indian entertainment industry – Balaji Telefilms.
Journey to Film
With all these his road leads slowly towards Bollywood, and he wrote the script for the film ‘Super Nani’ which was directed by Indra Kumar. He started his direction to drama film with ‘Best of Luck Lalu’, ‘Carry ON Keshar’, ‘Chal Jivi Laie’, “KehvatLal Parivar”. His first movie was supposed to release on 18th November, 2016, but it was affected due to demonetization on 8th November. He considers himself extremely lucky as legendary actors of industry Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Bachchan did cameo for his first film directorial venture. He was so nervous on the day and before that he didn’t sleep for three days. Sachin-Jigar are his very close friends and gave music to his projects.
His personal life and bonding
Vipul is a very family man and a dedicated friend. His wife, son and mother are his all-time support. He worships his parents as God. He is always indebted to Sanjay Goradiya for all the support and chance. He is ever thankful to Ekta Kapoor for all the chances. He considers himself extremely lucky to be able to take part in theatres, serials and films all together. He has taught his son direction in Gujrati, and now he is directing short films. He always encourages everyone to value mother language. He misses his mother the most in every successes and failures of his life.
Childhood Days
Vipul was born and brought up in Mumbai. He is a native of Amreli. Till class 10, he used to visit there with his parents for vacation. Till today he visits once a year. His mother was a home maker and his father had a normal job. He was brought up in a small 1bhk flat in Mumbai. For him maintaining any relations till forever is what he considers blessing. Since his hobby was cooking, so he thought of getting admitted to a hotel management college once. He cleared exams as well and got a chance in a college at Bangalore. But, his financial condition was not good, and hence it did not happen that time. He also did not want to go far from his family, but he continued his passion for cooking every Sunday.
Dream fulfilment tips
It was only because Vipul believed in his own dreams that today he directed a Bollywood movie which is slated to release soon. He always believes that struggle is in every field. You should never stop chasing your dreaming. Most importantly, you should never stop dreaming. Till today, he considers himself a struggler as one has to prove in every work. Everyone should learn from failures and mistakes and always be positive are his mantra for life.
