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According to Rushi Kota, when filming your first Hallmark movie days after your son’s birth, things tend to get stressful. Kota recently opened up about how his son was born days before filming began and how he had to learn his lines between diaper changes. As a first-time father, life was stressful, but the Grey’s Anatomy alum wouldn’t have it any other way.
Hallmark star Rushi Kota filmed Make Me A Match shortly after his son’s birth
Speaking to Us Weekly, the Make Me a Match actor said he didn’t navigate fatherhood very well while on set in Canada in March. In fact, what made a stressful situation even more stressful was that his wife’s due date was the day he started filming the Hallmark movie. Kota explained that their decision to induce birth a week early didn’t go as planned.
In fact, after the hospital canceled their elective procedure, Rushi said he and his wife, Reeshelle, tried “everything” to naturally speed up their son’s birth. It turns out this worked.
“Miraculously, he must have heard us because my wife’s water broke the next day and he was born after a smooth delivery,” Kota said, adding, “I just remember working on my character and memorizing lines in between changing diapers and no sleep.”
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Meanwhile, the actor said how tough it was being away from his newborn son when on set a few days later. However, he said, “I’m proud of the movie and can’t wait to watch it with him when he’s older.”
‘Unequipped’ to be a father
The Never Have I Ever actor went on to explain that now his son is three months old, he still feels “unequivocally unequipped to be a father.” Meanwhile, he said this is after he listened to parenting podcasts and read up on the subject of rearing newborns.
In fact, Kota said he might as well have done nothing to prepare for fatherhood and that he would still be in the same place that he started, adding:
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Luckily my wife is a freaking genius, and she knows exactly what to do, and she teaches me along the way while I flail around like fish out of water.
Rushi Kota and his first Hallmark movie
While parenting was stressful, Kota said he felt comfortable in his role as Boom in Make Me a Match, which premiered on June 24. He went on to explain what drew him to his role in the Hallmark movie, as the network gets even more inclusive.
“What drew me to the role of Boom in Make Me A Match was that I’d be playing the first South Asian leading man in a Hallmark movie,” Rushi said, adding, “It’s ironic that he’s a noncommittal serial dater, yet it’s his literal job to find people life partners through the family matchmaking business.”
In the movie, Vivi (Eva Bourne) learns about Indian matchmaking for her company’s dating app. Meanwhile, she unexpectedly became the subject of a setup with the matchmaker’s son, Boom.
Kota, who is Indian American went on to say that balancing modern romance and Indian matchmaking was easy, as they are more similar than people realize. He said:
While South Asian culture may be associated with arranged marriages, Indian matchmaking is not necessarily that anymore. Matchmaking has evolved. Just like modern dating [like dating apps], clients are matched based on characteristics like shared interests, physical attraction, age, location.
Meanwhile, Rushi said that couples who use matchmakers “may progress faster to marriage,” adding, “because things like astrological alignment and the vetting process between the families happens upfront.”
The Useless Humans star explained to Us Weekly that what the movie does well is that highlights how traditional matchmaking “can be modernized and made accessible to everyone.”
Congratulations to Rushi Kota and his wife, Reeshelle on the arrival of their baby boy.