‘Bambai Meri Jaan’ was released on Amazon Prime Video on September 14. The 10-part crime drama series was created by Rensil D’Silva and directed by Shujaat Saudagar. The show is about a gangster (Avinash Tiwary) and his upright father who is a police officer (Kay Kay Menon).
Ahead of the release of the show, Garima Das had a freewheeling conversation with Shujaat where he spoke about the challenges the team faced while filming the show.
He said, “I would say emotionally and physically it was challenging because Bambai Meri Jaan was made during trouble times, during Covid-19 which was really deadly, the first one especially because no one knew what was happening. A mammoth set which unfortunately had to be raised down and reconstructed from scratch. We were hit by a cyclone. So, yeah, a lot went into making it but the effort and determination of all involved, the entire crew backing me up and the actors. It was difficult to come back into the characters after such long gaps and also what happens is that when work was opening up, people had to take up other stuff as well which were new commitments. So, the back-and-forth thing for everyone was really challenging and I don’t think it was just for us. Of course, our scale was massive but I think all projects during that period of time did suffer this and the industry as a whole did suffer. We are fortunate that we are sitting today and half a decade later we are on the verge of releasing the show.”
When asked about the genesis of ‘Bambai Meri Jaan’, Shujaat said, “It all began with an idea by Zaidi saab. We all know that Zaidi has been a prolific reporter for over three decades who has chronicled organised crime, his various books are bestsellers. He was the one who came up with the story. This is a story which he created which was beyond any of his books. There is so much material that this man has and it’s always shocking and surprising. Rensil along with his team of writers has done a phenomenal job of creating this 10-part Season 1 out of this seed that Hussain Zaidi has brought. Rensil, I would call him the gardener of Bambai Meri Jaan who watered and fertilised this seed and then we got branches and leaves and Kritika (Kamra) and Nivedita (Bhattacharya) were the flowers of this tree of life.”
Rensil who had earlier helmed movies like ‘Kurbaan’ and ‘Ungli’ is the showrunner of the series. When Shujaat was asked if there were any creative differences during the making of the show, he jokingly said, “It was a bloodbath. You should see the scars on Rensil and me.”
He added, “Jokes apart, Rensil, besides being a brilliant writer is also a filmmaker. So, that really helped me because he understands the translation of the written word to the visual world. That understanding is really important to have. Of course, there are writers who are like pure writers but in terms of cinematic sense, for me, that was a pleasure and joy to collaborate with Rensil because he absolutely understands how a scene needs to be played out and staged and who are the other collaborators. Once it is written, the material has to be handed over in the safe hands of course the director and the actors because there are many times, as a director, I used to arrive on set thinking of a scene in a particular way but then the actors would come and they would hope into staging and blocking it and they would have their own take on it.”
The ‘Rock On 2’ director added. “I feel as creative people we need to be open to other people’s creativity as well because there is everyone is creative who is involved here right from the production designer to the cameraman to the stylists. Of course, the cameraman would have his own thing in terms of how he wants to do the blocking. So, yes, it has to come together. The vision comes from the written word but at the end of the day, it is coming together of so many minds to create a scene. It is important for me as a director that a particular performance can convey and communicate the emotion that I want. I think that would be my job. We all know Kay Kay, Nivedita, Avinash, and Kritika, they are all great actors. I am not anyone to teach them acting but I am the first audience and I am there to feel it for the first time and once I say okay, the whole world gets to see it. That’s my responsibility.”
