In 2017, after Rahul V Chittella’s maiden short film Azaad was screened by the UNESCO, a deeply impressed Manoj Bajpayee promised to work in his debut feature film. Almost six years later, it has resulted in Gulmohar. It’s easy to gauge that the drama — starring Sharmila Tagore, Bajpayee, Simran and Suraj Sharma — isn’t your run-of-the-mill Bollywood fare. That has much to do with Chittella’s cinematic sensibilities that have been shaped by working on Mira Nair’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2012) and A Suitable Boy (2020). 

As he developed the story, he could only envision Tagore and Bajpayee in the central roles. He knew that bringing the veteran actor out of her 12-year hiatus wouldn’t be easy. So, co-writer Arpita Mukherjee and he made the character as close to Tagore as possible, by listening to her old interviews. 

“The idea was to know how Sharmila ji is in real life, and incorporate that in the writing. It took her three days to read the script and call me to say she was on board. After that, I went to Manoj ji. After he read the script, his first reaction was, ‘When do you want to shoot it?’”

The director couldn’t believe his luck. “I reiterated that it was an ensemble film, and that he’d play a 55-year-old father. Manoj ji [didn’t see it as a deterrent].”

As Gulmohar drops on Disney+ Hotstar, the filmmaker is curious about his next step. Though he is a “Bombay boy” at heart, he is not entirely familiar with Bollywood. “People still don’t know that I live in Mumbai. So, I guess it will take a while [to land projects]. I am doing a show, and a film. Also, I hope my wife throws me another challenge,” he smiles.