There is a new health fad every month, a new fitness influencer every week, and countless recommendations every day. With Test Subject V, creator Kunal Avanti wanted to cut through the noise around health. “Today there is so much misinformation around nutrition. One person tells you to go vegan, another swears by paleo, someone else says eat this. There are industries built around sickness, and it’s become difficult to separate facts from noise,” he said. 

John Abraham

Instead of prescribing answers, Avanti chose to make himself the experiment that would shape the documentary. “I decided to become the lab rat. The idea was to ask questions and experiment on myself. I didn’t want to preach, I wanted to investigate.” Avanti, who admittedly had an unhealthy lifestyle, changed his diet and lost more than 30 kilos in the course of the docu.

‘Test Subject V’, streaming on JioHotstar, also has appearances by Genelia and Riteish Deshmukh

Test Subject V got its biggest boost when actor John Abraham came on board as a presenter. The creator recalled, “Back then, the project was a 130-slide presentation. When we met, John put his phone aside and listened patiently. At the end, he said, ‘We’d love to do this.’”