Mira Nair Speaks to Subhash K Jha On Namesake, Shantaram & Other Projects...

You're next getting into another Big One Shantaram.
(laughs) Yes, I'm very charged about that one. When in June 2006 Peter Weir left the project, the producers Warner Brothers who had approached me for the Harry Potter film, called me. It's a big big project. Not like you make a phonecall and you get Shantaram.

They sent me the script in confidence and warned me other directors were being considered. I went off to Kampala where I've a home and a film school, for the summer. There I read the book. When I returned they requested for a private screening of The Namesake. They liked the film.

We met in October. By then I was completely immersed in the book and its concept. I knew it thoroughly. It's the same territory as Salaam Bombay...It's set in my beloved city of Mumbai. Shantaram is set in the 1980s' Mumbai at a time when I was in the city.

The producers of Martin Scorcese's The Departed and my Namesake was the same. So I was doing the festival route with Martin's film. That's when another meeting was arranged.

The script for Shantaram was written by Eric Roth even before Peter Weir came on. So I was working from that draft and telling my producers my concept of how Shantaram should be done.

And how should it be done?
It's about time we got Mumbai and India right. Who needs another City Of Joy here? Really, so much talent in such films. But there's a hollowness from inside. Authenticity is very important to Shantaram.

And the producers feel I can deliver. I guess it my love for Mumbai city, my knowledge of the script and their fondness for my work that clinched the matter. And of course Johnny Depp felt Shantaram was in secure hands.

How's Johnny Depp?
Oh, for all stratospheric boxoffice status he's a humble soul. He's generally inquisitive about the world. He considers Shantaram his bible. You know Russel Crowe and Brad Pitt were also very keen.

Mr Bachchan is very impressed by you.
By lovely chance he was there for the first screening of The Namesake in Mumbai. Everyone was transported...the response was overwhelming. He's overwhelming in Black and Sarkar. The best part is he loves to act. He still enjoys the process. I can close my eyes and see Mr Bcahchan and Johnny Depp together.

You had a casting problem with The Namesake. You originally wanted Rani Mukherjee.
We met in New York. Her dates were looking completely fluid. It wasn't looking possible for her to define when it'd be possible for her to shoot for me. Then I met Karan and he told me his dates (for Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna).

Rani and I will definitely work together. But for The Namesake I wonder if she'd have been comfortable aging far older than she is. The heroine has to go from 21 to 50.

Was that a bit of an upset?
Fortunately it was early days for the project. I had seen Rani in Yuva and thought she was my Asima. Because she was Bengali I didn't go to Tabu first. Finally Tabu fitted in perfectly. She makes me believe in destiny. We knew each other personally.

I really hold her in high regard. Tabu loved the novel and her character. We worked together to create Asima, the musicality in her voice, her delicacy and strength. Tabu is an amazing listener. She took instructions and internalized them.

Tabu shot in New York where she had the comfort of anoymity and hence the freedom to reinvent herself into the character. She was free to be whatever what she wanted.

And then of course I marinate my actors completely in love. They open their hearts in front of the camera. That isn't an easy thing to do.

And Kal Penn?
He was a comic star before The Namesake. It's a ground-breaking role for Kal. I've to give my 15-year old son credit for my signing Kal. He loved Kal for Harold & Kumar.... My son would make me promise every night that I'd get Kal for my film.

Then Kal wrote to me and urged me to see his work. What really won my heart was when he said he saw my Mississippi Masala when he was eight years old in a mall in New Jersey. He was amazed to see people on screen who looked like him.

Then he also said The Namesake was his favourite book, and he empathized with the part of Gogol. He flew in on his own from LA to NY and auditioned.

Every aspect of his personality seemed correct for him to play the American desi. I allowed him to speak the way he does because that's right accent for Gogol.

Your last three films are based on works of literature.
That's just a coincidence. I've equally enjoyed doing original screenplays like Salaam Bombay and Monsoon Wedding. So I'm not pursuing the bestsellers of the world (laughs). It's just that the stories in The Namesake and Shantaram possessed me.

I'm lucky enough to get their rights. I'm developing an original screenplay about the war in the world...about the Iraq war etc. Right now it's just an idea.

Have you discovered your core as an artiste?
I'm assured now. I know how to do it and how to reap it. I must always take risks. I must have the adrenaline of never repeating myself. It would've been easy for me to do another film on street kids after Salaam Bombay. I refuse to be boxed.

Are you okay being a NRI filmmaker?
I've three fully functional homes in Delhi,Kampala and Manhattan. I've my whole biradari in Delhi. I give the airlines some serious business. This year I'm in India a lot. Shantaram goes to three continents. But it'll be shot mostly in Mumbai.

People think you're making a film on the life of the filmmaker V Shantaram.
Yes, my whole biradari thinks so. A photographer-friend sent me an image of V Shantaram's studio. I sent it to Johnny Depp telling him, here's the Shantaram in our life.