Saurabh Shukla on screenwriting - “I don’t think that words alone carry meaning”
The celebrated actor, film and theatre director, and screenwriter talks to Mihir Chitre about writing for Hindi films like Satya, Dil Pe Mat Le Yaar, Calcutta Mail, and Raat Gayi Baat Gayi, among others, over the last 25 years
Mihir: How did it all begin for you as a writer?Saurabh Shukla: Let me begin by telling you why I became a writer. I was in Delhi and movies aren’t something that the city offers you. So I joined theatre. And more than acting, I was interested in directing a play. But I found that it was difficult for me to understand others’ work because writing for the stage or screenwriting are specific kinds of writing. They’re not as fluid as novels, stories and poetry. So I told myself that I must make something that I could understand. So the need for writing came up. I wrote my first play and my journey as a writer began. Then I started reading more too. And acting happened by-the-way. People liked my acting and I started liking myself because of that. Then one day, Shekhar (Kapoor) called me for Bandit Queen and I moved to Bombay. And there began my journey as an actor as well.
As a schoolboy, Satya changed my perception of cinema. Tell us about writing it while also playing the iconic Kallu Mama.At the time, I had come to Bombay, people started knowing me as an actor but very few people such as Shekhar Kapoor and Sudhir (Mishra) knew that I wrote as well. Honestly, writing is a rather tedious process for me. And writing for others becomes even more difficult. Because film writing is not like writing a novel where you are sitting alone, ideating with yourself. Film is a director’s medium and although you may have your own ideas, you’re working towards the director’s vision. So, at the time, I wasn’t really keen on becoming a writer. One day, Ram Gopal Verma called me and asked me to meet him for writing his next film. He was a big and respected director and I was working out ways in my head about how to say “No” to him. But what happened was that when I met Ram Gopal Verma, he offered me a role in the film, and told me about the character. I loved the character and I thought it was a great opportunity for me as an actor. After that he said he wanted me to be one of the writers on the film as well. I didn’t want to let go of the acting opportunity so I nodded a reluctant yes to co-writing the film as well.
At that point, Anurag (Kashyap) was working with Ramu as an assistant. They had been working on the script – the idea, the characters, the world, etc. Then I got involved in the process and Anurag and I became co-writers. Satya was a bound script that the two of us wrote and then it was rewritten at the time of filming – because the actors improvised a lot. A lot of things that weren’t in the script found their way in because of the actors. I always say there are four writers in Satya: Anurag and I (who are officially credited), then Ram Gopal Verma, of course, who directed the film, and then the actors. It was very early in my career and I learnt a lot of things about screenwriting in that film. It was an enriching experience.
That brings me to my next question. Many films are co-written. How does the process of co-writing happen? And out of the many possible ways, which one do you prefer?There are two-three ways of going about co-writing and I have done it all. When Rajat (Kapoor), for example, brings me a script, I sit with it and improvise and then we meet and thrash out what’s working and what’s not. That’s one way where the writers are working in isolation initially and then they exchange ideas and arrive at the final script. The other way, which is more fun, is when the writers meet every day and ideate together. It’s like a party because you become friends with your co-writers and you’re meeting over coffee, chatting about whatever is happening in the world and also working on the script. I personally like this process very much. In fact, Satya was written this way. Anurag and I would meet and chat. Then Ramu sent us to his beautiful farmhouse in Hyderabad, which was all paid for. We got to fly there, there were caretakers there and a lot of food too. In the evenings, we would open a bottle and have a party. It was a great experience early in my career.
You started writing at NSD and even before that. How did that start?There are two writers who influenced me a lot when I started reading plays. One is Arthur Miller whose play, All My Sons, blew me away when I first read it. It put me in a conflict about one of the characters – whether he is good or bad, whether he deserved my sympathy or anguish. That play really inspired me. Then another writer, who’s a landmark figure in Hindi playwriting, Mohan Rakesh, influenced me a lot. Mohan Rakesh has written three plays. The first of his plays that I read was Aadhe Adhure, which was a contemporary play. The other two are historical. One is about Buddha and the other one is about Kalidasa. I am most drawn to stories of my time. So Aadhe Adhure fascinated me. It was set in the modern world and it had no ornamental dialogue. It was simple everyday writing as if the play has not been written at all but it is actually happening for real. My quest is to write scripts where people are left confused if this guy is actually writing it or just saying it. I like to keep things simple and natural.
Screenwriting is mysterious territory for a lot of people, even writers. Do you think so too?Yes, screenwriting is both mysterious and magical. But so is poetry. For a poet, though, poetry is not mysterious because they practise it. Similarly, a screenwriter, those who know the craft, know how to go about it. The mystery unfolds when you spend time on it.
Tell us about the craft of screenwriting and how it is different from others forms of writing.In a novel, say, one writes, “I entered the room and it was gloomy.” It’s up to the reader to interpret how exactly it was gloomy. Was it a gloomy afternoon or evening or night? And gloomy as in how gloomy? In screenwriting, however, that’s not the case because you will have a scene to see, an actor to look at and a lot changes with that. The most interesting part of screenwriting is to be able to hold attention with the script despite there being so many other elements at play. Another thing is, I have often seen many screenwriters get furious when someone changes their lines. I personally believe, in screenwriting, words are not at all important. Yes, they are there and they mean something. But I don’t think that words alone carry meaning. I believe, on the contrary, that meaning makes you choose the words. Meaning changes completely with the context of the scene. Say, one says, “Let’s die together.” But in a scene, for all you know, it may even mean a marriage proposal.
I have heard that in the 1990s, things were like the Wild Wild West for writers in cinema. How has a writer’s life, especially one without connections, changed?There’s a saying in French which means, “The more it changes, the more it remains the same.” For a young writer, who does not have a tangible piece to prove their ability, it is still as difficult to get people to believe him or her and find work. And that’s because film is an expensive activity. The smallest film that you could make today would cost nothing less than a crore-and-a-half. The moment that kind of money comes into play, most people find it difficult to take a risk with a total newcomer. That hasn’t changed since the time I came to Bombay.
About the writing part of it, back then was different in a way that the makers in the early 1990s and even in the 80s or late 70s wanted to have a mixed bag of emotions in every story. They wanted to make you laugh, cry, everything. So if one went with, let’s say, an intense, dark story, chances were that it would be rejected because it had only one colour. When I started in the 1990s, I met a lot of people who said that in the seventh to the tenth minute of a film, you should have the first song. At that point, you couldn’t imagine a hit film without many songs. Music was such an integral part of our culture. And films would be two-and-a-half to three hours long in those days. So in a way, you needed songs to hold attention for that long. I came in at a time when this had just begun to change. We had to fight for our ideas and stories. I remember there was a time when Vijay Krishna Acharya (director of Dhoom 3) and I were roommates and Tigmanshu Dhulia and many other writer-directors were frequent visitors. After seeing that nobody was accepting our ideas, we came up with a new strategy. We’d go to producers and say that our script was inspired by a Polish film. At that time, the producers did not watch much international cinema and they would think, “Okay, something like this has already been made” so they could try it too. Such was the importance of tried and tested work that an original idea had to be sold in the garb of a stolen one! From there, things have definitely changed. Now the same people ask me, “Saurabhji, please give me something original like you generally think of.” With OTT, the industry is a lot more open to ideas and experimentation in terms of what to say and different ways of saying it. For instance, now you can make a fully dark film and still run with it.
Until very recently, when people made formulaic films, they usually said that this is what the Indian audience wants. Do you think it’s fair to blame the audience for the long era of monotony in cinema?No, not at all. I think the reason for that kind of films was lethargy. Human beings are lethargic by nature and the people who ran the show just wanted to let whatever was happening carry on. They didn’t care enough to change or experiment. In fact, if you look at my father’s time, we had great stories in cinema. There were films like Guide, Bambai ka Babu, Pyasa, Sujata, all of Bimal Roy’s films, a film called Sharda, Jaagte Raho and they were all commercially viable films. Imagine, Bambai ka Babu has a man falling in love with his own sister, Sharda is the story of a man who goes away for a while and realizes that his father, who’s a widower, has remarried and the person he has married, not aware of his son’s relationship, is the son’s beloved. Now, we might say that these are brave stories for that time. But the fact is that these are brave stories of our time, not theirs. Till the 1960s and the mid 70s, these kinds of stories were regularly getting made. They were regularly breaking paths at that time.
Then what really happened post the mid 1970s that it all changed?Well, I have a long theory on that. I am no historian but I have my take. Movies are largely an unorganised sector. Now, some time in the 70s, the import of gold in India was legalised. This made the underworld go crazy. Smuggling of gold was the underworld’s main source of income. They got very rich and accumulated a lot of black money. They needed an avenue to make it white and they found the movies. The underworld started becoming the financer of many movies, and with that it slowly started assuming control over every aspect of the film including the story itself. Imagine trying to sell a socialist story to an underworld don! The dons wanted stories they could relate to or enjoy. Hence, you had mad love stories or films glorifying characters that don’t give a damn about the law. The aesthetic of storytelling in cinema as well as that of the whole of cinema itself started being controlled by people who had a very different aesthetic. They favoured stories that showcased their aspirations and bravado. The audience had no control over the stories. But they wanted to watch films every Sunday with their family. If these were the only options they had, so be it; they’d still watch them. And because of this, those kinds of films became hits and superhits. People in the industry then started saying that this is exactly what the audience wants. In reality, the Indian audience has been very sharp, understanding and accepting. All that we need to ensure is not to bore them. If you tell a great story in a boring way, that won’t do.
A filmmaker recently said, “I am not just a filmmaker. I have an agenda.” Where do you stand on this? Do you have an agenda as well?In a way, everyone has an agenda. I want to tell my stories and that’s my agenda. I want to write what I personally believe in. Now, there’s another thing called political agenda. I don’t necessarily want to make political comments but what a lot of people say is not really what they mean. I am not saying who and what is right or wrong. I’m just saying that the receiver has to be evolved enough.
As a writer, what’s your most creatively satisfying experience thus far?I believe my best piece is yet to be written. The journey is not over. Having said that, I don’t think I am a prolific writer. I write because I have to write. It’s as simple as that. Writing fills my day. I remember, during my low patch, writing kept me occupied. In those days, I may have been out of work but was never free because I always had something to do; I had to write.
Mihir Chitre is the author of two books of poetry, ‘School of Age’ and ‘Hyphenated’. He is the brain behind the advertising campaigns ‘#LaughAtDeath’ and ‘#HarBhashaEqual’ and has made the short film ‘Hello Brick Road’.
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