Behind "Masaba Masaba" with Sonam Nair
The director dishes on "Aunty Kisko Bola Bey," a novel approach to comedy, and her favorite moments from the show.
From left: Neena Gupta, Masaba Gupta, and Sonam Nair. [Source: Instagram/Sonam Nair]
If you read last week’s dispatch, you know how much I loved “Masaba Masaba,” the new Netflix show based on the lives of the designer Masaba Gupta and her mother, Neena Gupta.
Over the weekend I had a chance to chat with Sonam Nair, the show’s director, about her vision. We talked about comedy, fiction, the audience response and much more!
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The following are edited excerpts from the conversation.
Can you talk about how this opportunity came up and why it was special for you?
My name came up because I directed Neenaji in a short film called “Khujli” in 2017. I also have common friends with Masaba and we’re in the same circle, so it just seemed like I would get the vibe.
When I had to pitch myself to Netflix, they asked me, “What do you want to say through whatever you do with the show?” I said, I just want to show women who don't give up, no matter what. I knew it was going be fun and light but I also felt like these two women, despite having hard lives, are so full of life. They have such great sense of humor, they look great, and they never let it seem like a burden. So I just wanted to show that resilience: don't let things break your spirit, just keep going.
A poster for the show. [Source: Netflix India]
This kind of comedy has rarely been seen in India. Can you talk a little bit about that style and what inspired it?
When I found out the show would have Masaba playing herself and Neenaji playing her mother, but it would be scripted, I understood that it was something like “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” which I love. So, the charm of bringing this new kind of comedy to India really drew me in. And then I got sucked into how amazing these women are — everything was a creative decision, whether it was which part of their lives to focus on, or what the tone or messaging was. And truly, this has been my sense of humor for years.
Some people want a funny sound or a reaction shot after a joke. This subtle kind of comedy was something that the industry seemed a bit apprehensive about, but we know that there are different kinds of comedies that work… so why do we have to stick with that same old thing? I just wanted the cameras to be floating around — there are hardly any close ups and nothing is punctuated too much. And that was a bit of a fight to keep that kind of fluid humor going. Now, I'm just happy that it worked for audiences.
In terms of the freedom of making those creative decisions, do you think that it also helped that you were fictionalizing reality? Why do so?
Inspired by shows like “Master of None” or “Louie,” the purpose of the show was not to show you their inner lives and be like, “oh my god, is this what Masaba really eats?” For me, I looked at them as characters — I didn't have to write backstories or character traits. I tried to stick to that benchmark of what people might kind of already know: like Neenaji’s Instagram post asking for work and she got “Badhaai Ho,” or how Masaba and her husband put up an Instagram post, one of the first few people in India to announce their separation on social media.
So I just tried to kind of think like, even if I didn't know them and I didn't have access to them, what would the story be around these two characters?
How did you capture and touch upon so many realities that women face?
The purpose was to show women who love their work, and for them work is their priority and work is their first love. Their lives do not revolve around men or trying to get married or trying to get laid. Their life revolves around being really good at their job and being able to be independent. And that's why the show focuses more on the industries and their work environments.
I didn’t ask Masaba, who did you date afterwards? I didn’t really want to know. Instead, I asked, what happens in your office? What kind of girls work there? So with that skeleton, we tried to extract stories. Neenaji told me about struggling to find work and people who always assured her she’d get a role and then she wouldn't. Or like Masaba’s real like best friend, Pooja Dhingra, who is a chef and runs a couple of bakeries. After Masaba’s divorce, she was sometimes too self-involved and she said Pooja would call her out on it.
So these details came from them or from my life or the writers’ lives — things like the kinds of dates we've been on, the things that come in our DMs, little things like that. That was another purpose behind the show: I didn't want it to be actually just be about Masaba and Neenaji, I wanted it to be about all women.
One of my favorite kind of parts of this was the portrayal of child Masaba (by Amariah Awantaye)! Can you talk a little bit about that creative decision?
I was trying to think of a quirk to put in, because I thought everything is so real in this show that if it had a little magic in it, it would just stand out — it would have a signature thing. I remembered seeing videos on Instagram of Masaba as a kid and she was just so cute! And at that point, we were thinking that in the title sequence we'll have like a montage of their old videos or something.
And then I thought, what if we put that in the actual show? Anybody, when you see them as a child, you're like, ‘oh, they're so cute’ and you can't help but melt a bit. I just wanted that little feeling so that people love our lead character. That was my reason for it, just to pull at your heartstrings sometimes. And obviously, it came at points where she sometimes felt like a little kid — we always feel like kids sometimes, even though we pretend that we have our shit together. And we found Amariah, this amazing girl who looks like Masaba and has the same sass and everything! She's awesome.
Okay, so, I have to ask: Where did ‘Aunty Kisko Bola Bey?’ come from?!
When we were figuring out Neenaji's career trajectory, I wanted something in place of the short film we had done together — something which was almost very low budget and random, and then that blows up. Then from that, she becomes popular and gets an actual proper project, like “Badhaai Ho.”
(P.S. - Sonam appears in the video as the director! Peep the gold track suit.)
So we were struggling with maybe it would be a comedy sketch or something weird for YouTube. And then Neenaji randomly said, you know, all my career in all my career I've not done like one full song — it's always that I'm the side chick, like “Choli ke Peeche.”
Honestly, I feel like it's my life goal to give Neenaji what she hasn't gotten. So I decided we’d make a music video to give her her own personal item number. Because the theme of the series was that her age an issue, we thought: okay, it has to be around the fact that everyone says she's too old. Then because I'm the only crazy one, I thought it should be like a hip hop video where we get aunties in it, and there are hot, shirtless men in it.
On set, I swear to you, I was just like, how are people paying me to do this right now? How have I convinced everybody here that this is a good idea? While I was standing there in a gold tracksuit. [Laughs.]
You were secretly punking everybody!
[Laughs.] Yeah! I thought people would be like, just stop this shoot right now — this girl is mad, just get her off set. We had so much fun and everyone's just laughed the whole day. Neenaji, on the day we finished shooting, said, ‘you really made one of my dreams come true.’
What was your favorite part of shooting?
I think my favorite part was also the most challenging part: the boat sequence. It was a shooting nightmare! There was no cell signal, no walkie talkies were working. It was just fully chaotic. But I like to thrive on that, so those two days, my adrenaline was just on another level. I was barking instructions and everybody was a little seasick and hadn’t slept — shooting was a disaster. We were all wrecks after it. And when you see it on screen: it's exactly the feeling comes through of panic, anxiety, chaos, and mess. So, I really enjoyed that sequence but also that is a different kind of comedy, where you just want to puke and also laugh at the same time.
That was super fun. Also “Aunty Kisko Bola Bey?” — like, this is what I was born for. And the Farah Khan scene! She just killed it. Every day when I went to the editing room, I would just ask to see that scene again and just laugh.
What’s next for you?
I'm waiting for Netflix to say that we have a season two. They haven't officially said anything yet but the response has been so overwhelming and everybody wants a season two.
I have many people and things to make fun of left. I'm ready with my list. I'm also reading more scripts and I would like to continue doing like women-centric stuff and probably more shows that feature films and all because I think I really am more suited for something like, what the web has to offer.
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