Murrysville girl cast in Westmoreland native's latest film

Esha Chundru technically was cast as the main character in the upcoming film, “Definition Please.”

Luckily for the 8-year-old Murrysville girl, she was cast for a flashback to the character’s elementary-school days — and the toughest thing she had to memorize was how to spell “opsimath,” since her first scene was a spelling bee.

“I’m just really excited that I get to be in a movie,” said Esha of her role in the film written and directed by Westmoreland County native Sujata Day, who has a recurring role as Sarah on HBO’s “Insecure.”

The comedy-drama, Day’s feature directorial debut, is about the main character gaining some small measure of fame by winning the Scripps Nation Spelling Bee and, later, coming to grips with her place in both her life and family as the film progresses.

And Day had plenty of inspiration from which to draw the spelling-bee scene.

“I was a fourth-grader at Holy Cross in Youngwood, won my first spelling bee, and then I went to regionals and lost in the first round on ‘radish,’” said Day, who lives in Los Angeles.

The idea for the film came from a comedy sketch Day wrote in 2015, a sort of “where-are-they-now” look at former spelling-bee champs, one of whom had not achieved much else in life.

Day and Esha, along with Esha’s older brother Praneel, found one another through their fathers, both of whom work at the Elliott Company in Jeannette.

“We found out she was looking for a child actress, so we sent her a photo and profile and she wanted to meet,” said Ram Chundru, Esha’s father.

In June 2019, Esha shot the spelling bee scene at Greensburg’s Palace Theater, followed by shooting at Day’s family home in Greensburg. She had never acted before, and certainly was not expecting to do 23 takes of her scene.

“I just thought it would be cool to be in a movie,” Esha said.

Day said the third-grader was a complete professional.

“She never forgot a letter,” she said. “Spelled it right every time.”

“Definition Please” premiered at the Bentonville Film Festival in Arkansas and also was screened at CAAMFest in San Francisco, where it was awarded best feature film.

“We just played at the Philadelphia Film Festival, the Centre Film Festival and we’ll be playing at the upcoming Three Rivers Film Festival,” Day said. “It’s really kind of exciting for me to come back home this month with those festivals.”

Day said she is in talks with distributors and is looking at potentially releasing the film on a streaming platform.

“In this climate, I’m not really hoping for a theatrical release,” she said.

For Esha, the excitement is in seeing herself in more than just the trailer.

“I’m so happy that I get to be in a movie,” she said. “I would definitely do it again.”

“Definition Please” will be screened Friday at the Centre Film Festival.

For more on the film and Day, see SujataDay.com.