Sounds funny: Anahad Madhav, the man who reviews movies Piyush-Mishra style

You know you’re good when actor-poet Piyush Mishra personally congratulates you for the way you mimic him. You’re even better if you somehow manage to steer clear of rabid trolls and emerge as a social media star who is adored and appreciated by all. His sense of humility may suggest otherwise, but Anahad Madhav is good. 

Madhav is the man behind Fitoor Mishra, the ruthless yet brilliantly ingenious online critic who takes down film trailers in the voice of Piyush Mishra. The voice may be borrowed, but Madhav’s style is very much his own: he uses a mix of Hindi, English and Urdu, peppering it with cuss words and sharp political and pop-culture references. 

Fitoor Mishra became a raging success in April last year, when Madhav hilariously took apart the trailer of Half Girlfriend. Arjun Kapoor was “Boney ka launda” (Boney Kapoor’s son) and Shraddha Kapoor’s character was “Jagrate ki Beyoncé”. The video, which introduced the world to Madhav’s creative savagery, was an instant hit. More recently, he trained his guns at Thugs of Hindostan, an appallingly bad film whose trailer, for once, was made watchable by Madhav’s wit. 

Madhav could always impersonate Piyush Mishra, but it was when he joined Arré, the Mumbai-based entertainment content company, that Fitoor Mishra was born. “Arré was looking at the parody space when the Half Girlfriend trailer came out,” says the 25-year-old. “The idea was to be honest and say things that people generally feel but can’t really put a finger on.” The video, the script for which Madhav had penned in just 15 minutes, went viral within hours of being put out. Madhav says he was “awestruck” by the positive response that came his way. The best of which, of course, came from Piyush Mishra himself. 

“He was sort of lost when he called me. He wasn’t sure if this really was his voice, was this a voice-over artiste… it was a funny conversation,” recalls Madhav. A year-and-a-half and more than 20 videos later, the actor amazingly still likes to keep in touch and dole out advice. “He tells me if the voice is sounding right, and also suggests ways to make it more impactful,” says Madhav. 

Mimicking, most would agree, is the easy part. Elevating an imitation with strong writing is where many fail to hit the mark. Madhav seems to have succeeded in delivering on both counts. The earthiness that dominates his dialogue has been assimilated through his theatre days at Delhi University — he majored in English from Kirori Mal College — and then studying mass communication at Jamia Millia Islamia. “I’m an Odiya who has lived in Delhi all my life. Urdu is something I picked up at Jamia. And now I live in Mumbai,” he says. “The language in my videos is an amalgamation of all these things, which is what makes it so relatable.”  

Fifteen minutes is all it might have taken Madhav to obliterate Half Girlfriend, but regularly churning out entertaining content is much more difficult than it seems. “I watch one trailer about 20 times. Then I watch it on mute; then on half-speed. Moreover, there is always a danger of getting lost in the jokes. That’s why a lot of heads at Arré come together to produce the finished article,” he says. 

To add diversity to his work, Madhav came up with a satirical review of the iPhone X last year. “We mustn’t restrict Fitoor Mishra’s commentary to just big films. That’s why we are looking for new subjects all the time,” he says. Recent additions to his repertoire include takes on the Indian Premier League and Bollywood’s association with basketball. 

Fame has also brought some pressure. While most of his earlier videos were largely instinctive, more time is now spent on writing scripts and ensuring that the content retains the spontaneity that makes Fitoor Mishra tick. “The challenge is to not dilute the voice and keep saying whatever I want to, but in my own natural style” — one that has made quite a statement already.