Pix by Rupinder Sharma

Actress Nandita Das sees no big deal in switching sides. From giving spectacularly moving performances in front of the camera, Das has gone right behind it to direct her first feature film, Firaaq (In Such Times), produced by Percept Picture Company. The film, which will have a World Premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival next month, is scheduled to hit Indian theatres by year end.

But that’s just one of a string of projects that’s keeping her on her toes. She has already won over critics and audiences, who loved her sensitive portrayal of a Dalit woman called Champa in Ramchand Pakistani, a film on accidental international border crossings, by Pakistani director Mehreen Jabbar.

In a first of sorts, the movie has just been released simultaneously in India and Pakistan, in the first week of August. “The characters (of the film) are all victims of bureaucracy, suspicion, fear and prejudice. I’m sure people of both countries will be able to relate to the film,” she says.

A still from Ramchand Pakistani;

Das is also awaiting the India premiere of ace cinematographer Santosh Sivan’s Hollywood venture titled Before the Rains. The film that’s set in the stunning locales of Kerala in colonial India has had a theatrical release in the US.

But Das is an actress who has never tried climbing the slippery rope that’s Bollywood stardom. “She is an extremely intelligent person who’s also socially concerned. So, her world view is deeper. Inevitably she adds another dimension to characters she portrays,” observes filmmaker Shyam Benegal.

Benegal also points out that it is difficult to place her in the hierarchy of the film industry. “She stands out in a herd by virtue of being articulate and aware. At the end of the day, you have to keep in mind that in the entertainment industry, not many possess these qualities,” he adds.

Nandita Das plays a young journalist in Rituparno Ghosh’s Shubho Mahurat

And there have been rich dividends for her efforts. A feather on her cap will be The Ordre Des Arts Et Des Lettres, that’s been conferred to her this year by the French Government for her contribution to world cinema.

The dusky actress made tough choices even when she was still a greenhorn in the film industry. “My decision of doing selective films, in languages other than Hindi, or to live in Delhi and not Bombay, was all about making a choice,” she says.

Fire, the first Indian film on lesbian relationships starred Shabana Azmi and Das

But gifted performers don’t always get the roles they hanker for. And that’s when Das decided it was time to try her hand at film direction. “Actors are at the mercy of a hundred factors that shape a film. And so I thought maybe making a film from scratch and having the space and freedom to make what I want to would be more fulfilling,” she explains.

Her first venture Firaaq is a subject close to her heart. The movie (firaaq means separation and quest in Urdu), will be based on real life incidents ‘in the aftermath of a communal riot in Gujarat’. In fact, the disclaimer at the beginning of the film will state that it’s ‘based on a thousand true stories’. The film stars Naseeruddin Shah, Paresh Rawal, Deepti Naval, Raghubir Yadav, Sanjay Suri and Tisca Chopra.

(Right) Deepa Mehta and the actress

So, has the transition from actress to filmmaker been seamless for Das? “Being an actress it was tough to resist the temptation of ‘directing’ actors,” she says. “Actors like Naseeruddin Shah, Paresh Rawal and Raghubir Yadav, despite being so experienced, were very open to trying out things differently,” she points out. And her day was made when Naseeruddin Shah, at the end of the first day’s shoot, texted her saying, “Mighty impressed by your precise and clear instructions!”

Das says the madness of shooting and working with actors gave her the greatest of joys. “Being an actress, she knows exactly what she wants in every shot. She explained every scene so thoroughly that we had no problems in translating her vision into reality,” says Deepti Naval.

Mrinal Sen directed Das in the Bengali film Amar Bhuban

Das loves working with artistes who are overwhelmingly focused on their work and sensitive to a changing world. Das’s latest film Ramchand Pakistani has created ripples because of its cross-border lineage and theme. The film follows a string of episodes in the life of a seven-year-old Pakistani Hindu boy Ramchand, when he accidentally crosses over to India. Apart from anything else, the movie is also unusual because it has Pakistani Hindus as central characters and was released in India and Pakistan simultaneously. Das’s representation of the character has even evoked responses like “Nandita was strong and moving” by filmmakers like Mira Nair.

But authenticity has always been the operative word for Das. In Sivan’s yet to be released Hollywood venture, Before the Rains, she plays Sajani, a housemaid who has an illicit love affair with a British tea planter, leading to a face- off between the fanatically conservative society of 1930s Kerala and the Briton.

The film stars British actor Linus Roache and Das as the couple who throw caution to the winds. It has premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and picked up several awards, including Best Feature Film at the 41st WorldFest-Houston, US. “Nandita Das has always been fascinating to me as an actress, so I didn’t take much time to approach her with the role for my film. My Hollywood producers had no hesitation either, since she is very well known in the West too,” says Sivan.

Even Das gravitates towards rural characters like the one she portrays in Before the Rains. “I have done more rural characters, not as a conscious choice, but some of those stories and characters attracted me more. Just to wear modern clothes and have different hairstyles can’t be the reason to take on an urban film,” she says.

Das selects clothes for her role in the Bengali telefilm Collage

Interestingly, Das has always been a resident of the Capital and has never stayed for long periods elsewhere. And she has always had strong and abiding interests outside the world of movies.

In fact she did street theatre, worked with underprivileged kids while being in an organisation called Alarippu and also completed her Masters in Social Work, long before she was catapulted to stardom with Deepa Mehta’s Fire. Fire, the first Indian film on lesbian relationships, had Das going under the skin of a suppressed and ignored housewife who turns to her sister-in-law for emotional succour.

The film stirred up a hornet’s nest among staunchly critical right-wing groups for portraying same-sex liaisons in an Indian society, but Das’s performance was taken note of. She had a slew of Bollywood directors beating a path to her door. “If I wanted to do mainstream cinema, there was nothing stopping me to shift to Bombay soon after Fire,” she says.

But Das took the road less travelled. She opted for path-breaking films like Hazaar Chaurasi Ki Maa by Govind Nihalani, Earth by Deepa Mehta, Hari Bhari by Benegal and Bawandar by Jagmohan Mundhra.

Das insists her criteria for acting in a film has always been the script, the director and her role. So, she took roles in regional cinema whenever she was offered a character that could do with a bit of interpretation from her side.

Some of her celebrated regional films include Amar Bhuban by Mrinal Sen, Shubho Mahurat by Rituparno Ghosh, Kannathil Muttha Mitthal by Mani Ratnam and Naalu Pennungal by Adoor Gopalakrishnan. “She’s an actress of great calibre and is very sharp. She has even come to my house and we worked almost like family during the making of the film,” says Sen.

But working in meaningful cinema was just an extension of what she was brought up to believe: not to compromise. In her blog, Das says: “When I did some of my early films, Baba (Jatin Das) would often say, ‘films are like dragons, they suck you in and lure you in the world of money and fame. Best of people compromise, lose their path and forget why they got into them in the first place’.”

Das always had an unorthodox upbringing. She remembers her father once asking her to water the plants just before a maths exam because he thought it would help her de-stress. “I grew up thinking mothers go to office and fathers take care of the household! They cook and clean and for recreation, paint! I am so glad that stereotypes were broken in my mind at such an early age,” she says. Her father, painter Jatin Das agrees: “She has always done her own thing but I always have the solace of saying that she has never wavered from her ethics and dignity.”

Das also has her share of brickbats to go with the accolades. She has never rubbed shoulders with the glitterati and some in the industry accuse her of being standoffish.

Das defends her lifestyle vehemently. “A lot of my work entails being with many people, so having a bit of personal space and solitude is a must. My work doesn’t only involve acting but also advocacy work on human rights issues. Just because it doesn’t pay my bills, doesn’t mean I am not working or I am a recluse!” Perhaps that’s why she never shifted to Mumbai and even now on any day you might find her involved with activist work on issues like communal violence, violence against women and HIV AIDS.

More recently she has even breathed life to her concerns by producing and directing various public interest spots on education and rain water harvesting. She says insistently: “I have done work that resonated with my own interests and values.” And nobody is likely to argue with her on that.