(From left) Vikramaditya Motwane with his Sacred Games team - writers Smita Singh and Vasant Nath, Neha Sinha Roy, former head of development at Phantom Films, writer's room assistant Mantra Watsa and Varun Grover. Pic/Ishika Motwane

The team that adapted Vikram Chandra's Sacred Games for Netflix, reveals how it broke down the complex prose and plot to recreate a slow-burning Mumbai noir
Jane Borges (MID-DAY; July 15, 2018)

Binge watching Sacred Games — Netflix's first original Indian series that released last week — doesn't feel as euphoric, once you start engaging with its heroes. After the thrill of experiencing this on-the-edge-of-your-seat drama subsides, what remain are several unresolved questions and markers of Mumbai at its grittiest worst. For those who haven't read the novel, uncompromising superlatives are the only way to make sense of what you witness on screen — the fearless, hard-boiled characters, and their romance with bloodshed, gore and even, sex.

This could easily have been an ordinary tale of a delinquent's — Ganesh Gaitonde (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) — monstrous rise as a cold-blooded gangster in the country's mafia heartland, and his own end in the face of a looming apocalypse, which sets an anguished police officer Sartaj Singh (Saif Ali Khan) on a wild goose chase. But, writer Vikram Chandra, whose 2006 magnum opus novel was adapted for this series, was unapologetic in his brilliant prose and narrative. So, one would have expected little consolation when writers Varun Grover, Vasant Nath and Smita Singh took on the arduous task of recreating Chandra's vision on screen, in episodic format. They did, if anything, make this larger-than-life gangster-cop saga very real, disappointing only, by having us anxiously wait for the next season.

It's been a week since the release of the show, and already Grover, Nath and Singh are being eyed as fresh agents of change, having set a tireless benchmark for future writers of online television content. Now, chatting with us over a conference call, the writers reveal the trials and triumphs involved in penning this success story. "We were told that it had to be a gripping, slow-burner," Singh recalls of the brief that was given to them two years ago.

It's true that only copious amounts of reading would have enabled them to get a grip of Chandra's masterpiece. And while they went back to the book on several occasions, Grover admits, help came in handy in the form of research head Smita Nair and writers' room assistant Mantra Watsa, who was tasked with summarising every chapter, and making the complex plot easily accessible to them. "I think our biggest challenge was whether to set it in the period that the novel was written — when mobile phones were still a novelty, or to contemporise it," says Nath. The trio opted for the latter. This also meant re-imagining Chandra's story — 12 years ahead. "When we started out, we were scared about what Chandra would think of our work. We were chucking away some important characters from the original, and bringing in new ones. In the beginning, we were guarded about the script and did not reveal it to Chandra until we had completed the pilot run of the first episode. To his credit and to our amazement, he was very open to the changes," says Grover.

But with three creative heads along with directors Anurag Kashyap and Vikramaditya Motwane on board this project, one would wonder how they unanimously managed to agree or disagree on the same things. The very question makes the team break into a laugh. "Smita and I disagreed a lot. But, I think that is very normal in a room with different creative people. When our differences became evident, Vikram [Motwane] would finally step in to resolve the conflict," says Grover, who has previously worked on the screenplay and lyrics of the 2015 award-winning film Masaan. "But, arguing is healthy. It rarely ever happens that you don't come out with something great from it. It's not a writer's room if you don't argue. Ours was a vibrant one," Singh clarifies. "All three of us had very individual journeys over here, but towards the end I really began enjoying the process. We were firing on all cylinders, still arguing and bickering, but a lot of trust grew over the period that we worked together," says Nath.

If there has been some critiquing, it's for employing the formulaic idea of "operatic violence and stylised dialogues" used in hit crime dramas like Narcos and Fargo. While taking it as a compliment, Singh says any comparison takes away from the local flavour of Sacred Games, which thematically is different. Nath says like Narcos, they were trying to tell the history of a place through the underbelly. "In doing so, you get a much more honest cross-section understanding of a place. It's a great format to get to understand a culture," he says.

Then, there is also the unbridled cussing and sex scenes. "If you read the book, it is flowing in blood, and full of sex. So, one could not tell the story of this milieu, by getting rid of these elements, and not losing authenticity. We instead thought it in terms of the characters. For instance, with Gaitonde, who was indulging in rampant sex, I tried to understand what aspect of this was feeding into the understanding that he ends his story with. That brought me into the realm of his visceral engagement with other people. The last thing we wanted to do was load the script with gratuitous sex or violence," says Nath.

It took the writers a year to complete the project, and like Grover recently mentioned on his Facebook page, "the shoot looked too far away, when we had started writing, and then it was right there, knocking on our doors like those rude board exam invigilators while we wanted to write just one page, one sentence, one word more before the sheet is snatched away." One can only imagine what this trio would have done, if they had held on to that page longer.

Sonil Dedhia (MID-DAY; October 31, 2017)

Saif Ali Khan's Sacred Games has been the object of curiosity ever since it was announced in June this year. After all, it marks video-streaming platform Netflix's first original series for India, besides seeing directors Anurag Kashyap and Vikramaditya Motwane helming the thriller. While initial buzz suggested that the adaptation of Vikram Chandra's novel by the same name would be an eight-episode-long finite series, mid-day has learnt that the narrative will be spread over four seasons now.

A source close to production reveals, "The series is based on the novel, but the plot has been developed to suit the visual medium. The makers are now looking at locking in four seasons."

The source further adds that the eight episodes that are currently being shot in Mumbai will constitute the first season. Most popular web series follow the norm of having the narrative divided over a few seasons. We hear, the officials at Netflix as well as Kashyap and Motwane felt Sacred Games too would benefit from such a format. While retaining the essence of the bestseller, scriptwriters Varun Grover, Smita Singh and Vasant Nath have also added new characters and sub-plots to the series. "It will take time to establish these new characters as well as sub-plots. They will be explored over the course of the seasons." Officials at Netflix refused to comment.

Close associate reveals how Om Puri had found it impossible to recover from family betrayal (wife Nandita in her book) and public humiliation (on Arnab Goswami's show) over his heartfelt statements
Mohar Basu (MID-DAY; January 11, 2017)

To those who knew him, the downslide for Om Puri started some time ago, when his outspokenness invited a backlash he had never imagined and never recovered from. Smita Singh, who had recently been brought on board for his 'image correction', tells mid-day about how, in the days before he died, Puri poured his heart out on everything that was troubling him.

"Over the last few weeks, he wouldn't stop saying 'Jab main chala jaunga, tab duniya ko meri value hogi…' He never got over the public humiliation on Arnab Goswami's show. His pride was bruised, more so, because of his army lineage. He was never the same after that night. He publicly admitted that he had said those words ("Did we force them to join the army?..."), but that wasn't all what he said. The nature of news in this country, especially in the Twitter age, is such that only a part of the statement is shown to the world. Yes, he apologised. We started talking about that show. He was telling us how he went to Etawah (UP) to meet the parents of Nitin Kumar, the soldier martyred in the Baramullah attacks. He hosted a hawan at their home and gave them a huge sum of money. When he apologised to the family, Kumar's father had said, "Omji, insaan uttejna mein bohot cheezein bol jata hai. Aapko afsos hai aur humein aapse koi shikwe nahin hai." That was solace for him, to a certain extent, till the media made a mockery of that as well. He was patriotic. After that episode, he wanted to start his own political party, called Insaniyat, but could never muster strength for it. His spirit was shattered."

Losing a friend
Singh also talked about how a fallout with his best friend stung him. "That evening, we even got to know how he fell out with his best friend, who had been with him through college and drama school. After he spoke out against Aamir Khan’s intolerance statement vociferously, his dearest friend sent him a text message saying, "F*** you!" That was that between them. He made multiple attempts to reconcile, but never got a reply," she said.

Wife's betrayal
Personally, too, his life was turbulent. The evening before he passed away, he talked about how his wife (Nandita Puri) had made a public joke of him (after she published his biography that had some salacious details about his life). "He was doing his best to move on. He was vulnerable that evening, gurgling down pegs of whiskey like he did every day, but he had the haunted look of a broken man. The producer of his next film (Rambhajan Zindabad) Khalid Kidwai offered to drop him to his friend, Manoj Pahwa's, house," she said.

His estranged wife Nandita tells us, "We were supposed to go for Pankaj Kapur's daughter, Sana, and Pahwa's son, Mayank's engagement ceremony. Om called me and by the time we got there, he reached my house. He went up to my mom and said, "Kya budhia, kyun sadd rahi hai yahan. Tu bhi mere saath swarg chal." He was in high spirits. He called me again and said, "Tum aur Ishaan jaldi aa jao." I told him we'd see him later. When he called me again, I told him, "It's too late; we’ll see you tomorrow." Ishaan and I still regret not seeing him that day. Ishaan was going to be with him on January 8, 9 and 10 for the shooting of 'Tubelight', and they were to head to Khandala from there,” says Nandita.

Nandita adds, "We were not divorced and are still legally married. We had a separation. Trishul is his home and my marital home. By the Hindu law, he was allowed one wife. It can be an ex-wife and a current wife. Om had only one wife. He helped his nephews and strangers, but now when his son needs him, he is gone. I’ll miss him terribly because he is a habit. I have spent the longest part of my life with him more than my son or my parents."

Waited for son
Manoj told us, "He came for barely 15 minutes and left soon after. I don’t know where he was headed." Khalid drove him down to Nandita’s house, but by the time they reached, Ishaan was already at the party. "Omji didn’t want to go back to the party and asked Ishaan to return home. But, when Ishaan didn’t come for a bit, we left. I dropped him home," said Khalid.

Buddhism beckoned
Singh said Buddhism and its values had immensely influenced Om in his last days. "He wanted to take a 15-day trip to Lumbini (Nepal), the birthplace of the Buddha. He was scheduled to be there for 15 days later this month," Smita said.