ALL MY BIG DECISIONS IN LIFE MADE SENSE TO NO ONE BUT ME
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Nandana Sen is the daughter
of Nobel laureate and Bharat Ratna Amartya Sen and Padma Shri Bengali
writer Nabaneeta Dev Sen. Her parents separated when she was very young,
but that has not deterred her from being close to the both of them, who
she loves equally . She is honest, loyal, strong and thoughtful and
claims to have never lost a friend in her life. She is confident and has
strong opinions. She is proud of who she is and has lived life on her
own terms.Coincidentally , India's first pin-up girl, she plays
acclaimed painter Raja Ravi Varma's muse Sugandha in Ketan Mehta's
upcoming biopic Rang Rasiya, where she took the bold decision to pose
top nude for the artist.After break-up of her nineyear-old live-in
relationship with Madhu Mantena, she moved to New York in the year 2012,
where she met John Makinson, the Chairman and CEO of Penguin Publishing
and subsequently got married to him in June 2013. Over a cup of coffee,
she spoke to Bombay Times about her political awareness, her social
consciousness and why Kolkata will always remain her favourite city
.Excerpts:
How did you come into films?
My formative years were spent in Calcutta, so even though I have lived most of my life in other places, I absolutely feel that that is where I am from. I was always a geek, very nerdy and always had a book surgically attached to my hands, but I loved films right from when I was young, even though I never thought I would be an actor. I did think that I would be a film writer and was so drawn to the power of cinema and its influence on shaping the way people think and act that I went to USC film school after graduating from Harvard. While studying, I got accidentally cast by Goutam Ghose in Gudia. I wanted to assist him, but was shocked when he said he wanted to cast me as his lead.He said, `I will let you assist me if you agree to be my lead heroine.' And I made my film debut.I had always been a very cerebral introverted person. I had a tendency to over-intellectualise things. I very much lived in my brain and head and suddenly , as an actor, I had to really connect with my instinct and look at myself and my emotions. I could not hide behind my brain and that was both exciting and difficult. Gudia went to Cannes and did very well and I started getting work in the US and in Canada. But I always wanted to come back to India, as I had left before I had grown up and wanted to live and work here as an adult. So I decided to move to India and got my first role as Rani Mukerji's younger sister in Black.
Your parents are both academicians. Did they support your decision to become an actor?
My family has always been cautiously supportive and I completely understand their worries and their frustrations, as I was always an excellent student so everybody assumed that I would be an academician. I was always a topper all four years at Harvard in Literature and writing and had gotten into the Ph.D programme I wanted and yet, I chucked that for a film career.They were still okay when I decided to go to film school, as they could see me becoming a writer and director, but when I decided to be an actor, they were surprised and worried as I literally showed up in Mumbai with a backpack not knowing any one here. Of course, now they are extremely supportive and proud of my work and visit festivals around the world with me. But all the big decisions that I have made in my life often did not make sense to anyone else, but to me. But I am glad that they have never proved me wrong. I have lived in multiple continents, had multiple careers, have decided to change things around at moments where everything in my life seemed to be extremely comfortable.
Talk about your relationship with your parents?
I am really attached to the both of them and am close to them in different ways. My dad is more rational and my mom more emotional. So, sometimes, if I don't want to upset my mom but I want to discuss something, I will go to my dad, and sometimes if I am emotionally affected by something that has happened to me where I know that my dad might not think it to be a big deal, I would go to my mom as she would understand it. That said, I spoke about doing Rang Rasiya to both of them exhaustively , as I wanted their advice separately , both, for my and their sake. I wanted to know how they would feel and wanted to talk to them about how they thought it would affect my life. They were extremely supportive and gave me a lot of strength and are today very proud of the film.They are both extremely liberal, politically conscious and socially aware. They are both a part of the world of thinking and while I look like my mum and am independent, I really think I am my parents' daughter. I am very close to my family and friends and care about what they think.
What do your parents like the most about you?
What my mum says she likes most about me is my kindness and emotional generosity , while my dad has always really enjoyed my intellectual side, my writing and the arguments we have.
So were you the reason for his writing the book `The Argumentative Indian'?
I think that was brewing in his mind way before I came on the scene, but that said, all of us in the family are ambassadors of his book.
What made you do Rang Rasiya?
It was not an easy decision at all. But I think it was destined in a way . Firstly, Ketan Mehta and I were to work together even earlier in Mangal Pandey, but I was tied up at that time.Also I have always been fascinated by Raja Ravi Varma's work from when I was young.One of the reasons I have loved Ketan's work, be it Mirch Masala or Maya Memsaab is because his films are about women power and of giving equal rights to women. And this film in particular, makes such a powerful statement of how vulnerable women are in society and yet how incredibly strong they can be. Also for the fact that the film stands for democratisation of Gods, for equal rights for men and women, how critical it is for us to protect freedom of expression and about religious intolerance. All this drew me to the film. So my decision to do the film was as much an artistic decision, as it was a political one. Why would I pass on the chance to play Sugandha, an archetypal Indian woman who was also a trendsetter of her time?
Was the nudity in Rang Rasiya scary for you or your parents?
Much as I wanted to do the film, it was not an easy decision for me. I had to let it sit with me and imagine what it would be like to see myself on screen and I did ask myself that and asked all the people I cared about -my parents, my boyfriend with whom I was living at that time (Madhu Mantena, who is still my best friend). It was important for me to know how they would feel. But by the time I decided to do the film, I had managed to conquer my feelings about it and Ketan was extremely sensitive about all my trepidations and made me very comfortable.I feel strongly about women's bodies getting objectified on screen and so, the key question we asked ourselves many times was whether or not nudity was essential to the film. And it was. And while it was a big deal, my body is as much a part of my humanity as much as my brain, as my heart, as my morals and I would never feel ashamed to express it with the dignity it deserves.
Would you ever come into politics?
No, as I think I would be a terrible politician. But I have always been a very political person and all my films more often than not have a political and social conscience. Be it The War Within that is about international terrorism or The World Unseen about apartheid or even a Bollywood film like Tango Charlie that was about crossborder violence and how women are always victims of war, Black about children's disabilities or Rang Rasiya that is about censorship or freedom of expression. I feel that as citizens of the world we cannot distance ourselves from what is disturb ing around us and so what hap pens around me affects me deeply and that is also one of the reasons that I am drawn to cinema, due to its transforma tive powers and its ability to be able to make us look at the world differently . One of the first disagreements I had with my parents was me wanting to go to America to study and not to Oxford or Cambridge. And the reason I chose US was that this was the first adult decision I was making and I didn't want to choose a country that had colonised us for 200 years. It was as simple as that for me. I have always been wired like that.
What attracted you to your husband John?
He too is very nerdy and likes poetry just like me. While on the one hand, he is a serious per son, there is also a wonderful child like silliness about him, which leads him to write cute poems about me or making up stories when I can't fall asleep.
We have a really playful rela tionship. I love the fact that we never run out of things to say to each other and we have both embraced not only each other, but also each other's families with a lot of love. I think we are both similarly playful and romantic. We both communi cate with each other obsessively , as both of us have a need to do so. While I am quite tough with people I don't know, I am extremely vulnerable with peo ple that I am close to and can easily get walked all over by them.
Are you stubborn?
I am stubborn though I am not inflexible. That is one of the things that happens when you leave home when you are young, change continents and choose to change your life a number of times, when no one forced you to do that. My mum didn't even want me to leave Calcutta. She was happy for me to go to Presidency College, where both my parents had gone. But you become your own emotional anchor when you choose to make your own choic es. I have never been a victim of my circumstance. Everything that has happened to me is because I have made those choices.
Do you have a favourite city?
Kolkata and it will always remain my favourite city as my mother lives there.
My formative years were spent in Calcutta, so even though I have lived most of my life in other places, I absolutely feel that that is where I am from. I was always a geek, very nerdy and always had a book surgically attached to my hands, but I loved films right from when I was young, even though I never thought I would be an actor. I did think that I would be a film writer and was so drawn to the power of cinema and its influence on shaping the way people think and act that I went to USC film school after graduating from Harvard. While studying, I got accidentally cast by Goutam Ghose in Gudia. I wanted to assist him, but was shocked when he said he wanted to cast me as his lead.He said, `I will let you assist me if you agree to be my lead heroine.' And I made my film debut.I had always been a very cerebral introverted person. I had a tendency to over-intellectualise things. I very much lived in my brain and head and suddenly , as an actor, I had to really connect with my instinct and look at myself and my emotions. I could not hide behind my brain and that was both exciting and difficult. Gudia went to Cannes and did very well and I started getting work in the US and in Canada. But I always wanted to come back to India, as I had left before I had grown up and wanted to live and work here as an adult. So I decided to move to India and got my first role as Rani Mukerji's younger sister in Black.
Your parents are both academicians. Did they support your decision to become an actor?
My family has always been cautiously supportive and I completely understand their worries and their frustrations, as I was always an excellent student so everybody assumed that I would be an academician. I was always a topper all four years at Harvard in Literature and writing and had gotten into the Ph.D programme I wanted and yet, I chucked that for a film career.They were still okay when I decided to go to film school, as they could see me becoming a writer and director, but when I decided to be an actor, they were surprised and worried as I literally showed up in Mumbai with a backpack not knowing any one here. Of course, now they are extremely supportive and proud of my work and visit festivals around the world with me. But all the big decisions that I have made in my life often did not make sense to anyone else, but to me. But I am glad that they have never proved me wrong. I have lived in multiple continents, had multiple careers, have decided to change things around at moments where everything in my life seemed to be extremely comfortable.
Talk about your relationship with your parents?
I am really attached to the both of them and am close to them in different ways. My dad is more rational and my mom more emotional. So, sometimes, if I don't want to upset my mom but I want to discuss something, I will go to my dad, and sometimes if I am emotionally affected by something that has happened to me where I know that my dad might not think it to be a big deal, I would go to my mom as she would understand it. That said, I spoke about doing Rang Rasiya to both of them exhaustively , as I wanted their advice separately , both, for my and their sake. I wanted to know how they would feel and wanted to talk to them about how they thought it would affect my life. They were extremely supportive and gave me a lot of strength and are today very proud of the film.They are both extremely liberal, politically conscious and socially aware. They are both a part of the world of thinking and while I look like my mum and am independent, I really think I am my parents' daughter. I am very close to my family and friends and care about what they think.
What do your parents like the most about you?
What my mum says she likes most about me is my kindness and emotional generosity , while my dad has always really enjoyed my intellectual side, my writing and the arguments we have.
So were you the reason for his writing the book `The Argumentative Indian'?
I think that was brewing in his mind way before I came on the scene, but that said, all of us in the family are ambassadors of his book.
What made you do Rang Rasiya?
It was not an easy decision at all. But I think it was destined in a way . Firstly, Ketan Mehta and I were to work together even earlier in Mangal Pandey, but I was tied up at that time.Also I have always been fascinated by Raja Ravi Varma's work from when I was young.One of the reasons I have loved Ketan's work, be it Mirch Masala or Maya Memsaab is because his films are about women power and of giving equal rights to women. And this film in particular, makes such a powerful statement of how vulnerable women are in society and yet how incredibly strong they can be. Also for the fact that the film stands for democratisation of Gods, for equal rights for men and women, how critical it is for us to protect freedom of expression and about religious intolerance. All this drew me to the film. So my decision to do the film was as much an artistic decision, as it was a political one. Why would I pass on the chance to play Sugandha, an archetypal Indian woman who was also a trendsetter of her time?
Was the nudity in Rang Rasiya scary for you or your parents?
Much as I wanted to do the film, it was not an easy decision for me. I had to let it sit with me and imagine what it would be like to see myself on screen and I did ask myself that and asked all the people I cared about -my parents, my boyfriend with whom I was living at that time (Madhu Mantena, who is still my best friend). It was important for me to know how they would feel. But by the time I decided to do the film, I had managed to conquer my feelings about it and Ketan was extremely sensitive about all my trepidations and made me very comfortable.I feel strongly about women's bodies getting objectified on screen and so, the key question we asked ourselves many times was whether or not nudity was essential to the film. And it was. And while it was a big deal, my body is as much a part of my humanity as much as my brain, as my heart, as my morals and I would never feel ashamed to express it with the dignity it deserves.
Would you ever come into politics?
No, as I think I would be a terrible politician. But I have always been a very political person and all my films more often than not have a political and social conscience. Be it The War Within that is about international terrorism or The World Unseen about apartheid or even a Bollywood film like Tango Charlie that was about crossborder violence and how women are always victims of war, Black about children's disabilities or Rang Rasiya that is about censorship or freedom of expression. I feel that as citizens of the world we cannot distance ourselves from what is disturb ing around us and so what hap pens around me affects me deeply and that is also one of the reasons that I am drawn to cinema, due to its transforma tive powers and its ability to be able to make us look at the world differently . One of the first disagreements I had with my parents was me wanting to go to America to study and not to Oxford or Cambridge. And the reason I chose US was that this was the first adult decision I was making and I didn't want to choose a country that had colonised us for 200 years. It was as simple as that for me. I have always been wired like that.
What attracted you to your husband John?
He too is very nerdy and likes poetry just like me. While on the one hand, he is a serious per son, there is also a wonderful child like silliness about him, which leads him to write cute poems about me or making up stories when I can't fall asleep.
We have a really playful rela tionship. I love the fact that we never run out of things to say to each other and we have both embraced not only each other, but also each other's families with a lot of love. I think we are both similarly playful and romantic. We both communi cate with each other obsessively , as both of us have a need to do so. While I am quite tough with people I don't know, I am extremely vulnerable with peo ple that I am close to and can easily get walked all over by them.
Are you stubborn?
I am stubborn though I am not inflexible. That is one of the things that happens when you leave home when you are young, change continents and choose to change your life a number of times, when no one forced you to do that. My mum didn't even want me to leave Calcutta. She was happy for me to go to Presidency College, where both my parents had gone. But you become your own emotional anchor when you choose to make your own choic es. I have never been a victim of my circumstance. Everything that has happened to me is because I have made those choices.
Do you have a favourite city?
Kolkata and it will always remain my favourite city as my mother lives there.
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