Reinventing "Monsoon Wedding" ft. Mira Nair

Mira Nair spoke about a "Monsoon Wedding" musical, film festivals and more in a chat with Brut at MAMI film festival. Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival

Transcript

00:00Yes, you can completely expect a whole new avatar of Monsoon Wedding.

00:04The cinema is not an easy thing. It's not something that everyone can do.

00:07Oh, how lovely, what a lucky guy. Namaste.

00:10Salaam, this is Meera Nair on Brute.

00:23Yes, you can completely expect a whole new avatar of Monsoon Wedding

00:27because we have spent actually more than 12 years now

00:31inventing a Broadway-bound stage musical of Monsoon Wedding, which is now very,

00:36very ready and in fact will open in Bombay towards October-November of 2024.

00:57This is a rare time to be in a jury where you can immerse simply

01:19in what other people have done and blood, sweat and tears of their cinema,

01:24but you're working with peers to evaluate it.

01:27But there is a real sense of, I don't think there's a, for me,

01:31I don't go into it with a great sense of judgment.

01:34I go into it with an open heart to be moved, to be affected,

01:39but also to be ruthless, I must say, because I'm like that.

01:43You know, the cinema is not an easy thing. It's not something that everyone can do.

01:47So when you encounter something that is showing you a new way or making you feel in a way that

01:56is so rare that it is very, very unusual, and I feel the privilege of it.

02:06I think if India contributes to the excellence of cinema and to the love of an artist,

02:14then it doesn't need to do any more to attract any international diaspora or whatever.

02:21You know, we must do what we do with rigor, with beauty, with not imitation.

02:28We don't want to be who they are. We want to be who we are.

02:33But we must know, we must arm ourselves with the excellence of the world.

02:39But forget about, you know, imitation or begging people to come to our shores,

02:46because what we have to offer is more immense

02:50and more interesting and more distinctive than much else in the world.