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Cover Story: Look back and laugh
We got Saloni Gaur, everyone’s fav funny girl to recap 2023’s top moments. Hits, losses, wows, livers, Jhandeya. Did we really live through it all?
Even Saloni Gaur can’t believe it’s the end of 2023 already. The comedian, mimicry artist and digital creator is 24, and made it to Forbes India’s Top 100 Digital Stars list this year. She won an award for her funny videos at Creators United, India’s first experiential festival for creators. She hit 5 million followers on YouTube. And, she got married, that one milestone that many fans still refuse to believe. “I didn’t post anything about it for the longest time and then I suddenly did. My followers were surprised and are still wondering if this is fake,” she says.
Gaur grew up in Bulandshahr, a small town in Uttar Pradesh, and now lives in Delhi. She shot to fame in 2019 with her character, Nazma Aapi, a middle-class Muslim woman jadedly commenting on the circus of society and life. But she’s fast expanded her repertoire to include other stock types: Adarsh Bahu, Pinky Dogra, Kusum Behenji, Doordarshan Didi. She hosted the variety-sketch show Uncommon Sense With Saloni on Sony Liv in 2020. She had a role in the critically acclaimed 2022 drama Campus Diaries. And she’s polished up her impersonations of Kangana Ranaut, Sonam Kapoor, Ananya Panday and others.
It’s, by all accounts, a busy life. Yet, she’s found time to pay attention to the ups and downs of 2023. Here’s how she viewed the year gone by, even as Nazma Aapi slips in every now and then.
25 January. King Khan is back on screen.
Like pretty much any living, breathing film buff, Gaur is a Shah Rukh Khan fan. She caught a first-day first-show screening of Pathaan. “His wins feel personal,” she says. “Only last night my family and I were watching some film and then we realised we weren’t having fun So we ended up watching Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham (2001) instead. I have never seen people whistle for any other movie star as much as they do for him. It’s fun to watch a film in the theatre only when it’s a Shah Rukh Khan film.”
13 March. India’s Oscar moment.
Indians giving out awards. Big wins for The Elephant Whisperers and RRR. “I almost forgot this because it happened so early on in the year,” Gaur says. Indians typically applaud a win today and forget about it tomorrow. But Indian performers everywhere have basked in Oscar glory all year. Obviously, we aim for more.
31 March. The stars descend on the NMACC.
The opening party of the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre in Mumbai was so packed out with Indian celebrities (plus Zendaya, Tom Holland and Gigi Hadid) that Gaur calls it the “MET Gala of India”, paid for by the Ambani family. “And it was great,” she adds. “When rich people use their money not only to entertain themselves but also to entertain us, I am a fan.” The event gave us Internet gold when Zendaya was called “Jhandeya” by the Indian photographers. “Someone called Gigi Hadid, Shakira, and their friend immediately corrected them.”
17 June. The rise and rise of Puneet Superstar.
“He started from nothing and then went on Bigg Boss OTT,” says Gaur. Puneet Kumar started out on TikTok, posting videos of himself as he smeared floor cleaner, chilli powder, toothpaste and other questionable items on his face; shouting at the camera; and filming silly antics. It made him so popular,he secured a spot on S2 of the reality game show. He was kicked out within 24 hours, but it’s testament to the fact that social media has levelled the playing field for stardom. “We may have been a little classist in the way we approached celebrities before. But with him, we realise how everyone who wants to create content will find their audience,” Gaur says.
21 July. The Barbenheimer battle.
In one corner, a films about bombs, men and a man who made a bomb. In the other corner, a bubblegum pink movie about a Mattel doll. Who’d win the summer blockbuster head-to-head, Oppenheimer or Barbie? Gaur didn’t have a Barbie when she was little. Why? “Because I have a brother five years older, and our parents could only afford to buy toys that both of us could play with. We usually ended up with footballs,” Gaur recalls. She ended up watching Oppenheimer, since she’s a Cillian Murphy fangirl and binge-watched Peaky Blinders. “My brother loved the Barbie movie more. He said Oppenheimer put him to sleep!”
August. When delulu became the solulu.
The K-pop community started using Delulu around 2013 to describe obsessive fans. A decade on, it went firmly mainstream as young folks started to associate it with a mindset that could result in positive outcomes. Delulu is the solulu roughly means that delusion, or a bit of craziness, is a good attitude to have in a world you can’t control. The term was everywhere, perfectly summing up its own appeal. Gaur doesn’t subscribe to it. “I have always been very realistic,” she says. “But it’s okay if being delusional is your thing.”
9 October. India starts looking like a wow.
Delhi boutique owner Jasmeen Kaur’s enthusiastic Insta video (@designmachinesuitslive), hawking a yellow salwar suit, spawned a national catchphrase. Everyone referenced or remixed “So beautiful, so elegant, just looking like a wow”. “It really was a wow moment,” says Gaur, though she admits that she soon got weary after it began cropping up in every video. “Whatever you need to do to build your brand, I guess,” Gaur says, commending Kaur’s ingenuity. Kaur’s page now has more than a million followers.
9 November. What does Orry do?
Orhan Awatramani got on India’s radar in the last months of 2023, mostly because he managed to schmooze with India’s superrich (the Ambani family) and the super famous (Janhvi Kapoor, Ananya Panday and Deepika Padukone) without letting on how he got there. As speculation mounted, Orry rode the wave, amassing 857K followers on Instagram (@Orry1). Then, on an interview with MensXP, he was asked what he actually does for a living. His response: “You go for a job, you are a jobber. You paint, you are a painter. I am living, I am a liver. Yeah, I am a liver.” And just like that, a meme was born.
“Coming across such people is normal for me,” says Gaur, laughing. “There are so many like him, it’s just that he got more attention than others did. He’s a very intelligent digital marketer.”
19 November. India and Australia play the World Cup final.
The Indian men’s cricket team lost the World Cup to Australia on home turf in Ahmedabad. For Gaur, this may have been the hardest thing to witness this year. “For our parents, the 1983 World Cup was a momentous occasion. They remember every important moment from the final match,” says Gaur. India won in 2011 too. “This was such an opportunity, so it was difficult to stomach the loss. But it’s okay. We’ll cheer for them again.”
19 November. Rohit Sharma’s daughter offers hope.
An old video of the Indian skipper Rohit Sharma’s five-year-old daughter, Samaira, went viral right after their loss at the World Cup. It features her exiting a building and telling the paparazzi that her father is in his room, and in a month he will laugh again. “It’s amazing to see how, even at such a young age, she understands so much,” Gaur says. “That video melted my heart.”
3 December. Rizz is the word of the year.
Rizz, Gen Z slang for “style, charm or attractiveness,” or “the ability to attract a romantic or sexual partner” — was named Oxford’s 2023 Word of the Year, beating situationship, prompt, de-influencing and Swiftie. “I don’t know anyone who uses that word,” Gaur says. She didn’t know what the term meant until a few days ago. “I don’t even use words whose meanings I actually know. This one? No one should expect me to use it.”
