Estimated reading time: 11 minutes
Art as an Agent for Social Change
After a trailblazing 50 years in the film industry and scooping up a record five National Film Awards for Best Actress (the most by any Indian actor), internationally acclaimed actor and activist Shabana Azmi is still driven by the single most important value she absorbed from her parents – that art should be used as an instrument for social change. An intrepid champion of several causes in India for women, children and the underprivileged, the former Rajya Sabha member spoke to India Currents about her vision for the future of children, Indian American stories, her latest Netflix outing and AI in films.
Azmi is in the United States to support CRY, Child Rights and You America’s annual gala series across 6 cities, including in the Bay Area at Villa Ragusa in Campbell on Sunday May 4th.
The interview has been edited for brevity and clarity
India Currents: Tell us about your association with CRY America. Why is this cause so important to you? What are your expectations from this gala series?
Shabana Azmi: The future of our children is my most important concern. I have had a very happy childhood. I was given equal opportunity with my brother. It was a very democratic family where we were never shushed because we were children. We were encouraged to speak our minds. When you receive this kind of love, you can rise to the highest level of your potential.
Of course, one should want to take it for granted for any child, but unfortunately, that is not the case. It’s unbelievable that in the 21st century, children are being discriminated against based on gender, there is child labor, child marriage, and illiteracy.
What makes CRY so special is that their body of work has been very impactful; CRY realizes that just putting a child in school is not enough. The entire ecosystem around the child needs to be addressed: parents, teachers, community leaders, government agencies, all of them need to be involved. So they’ve got partners in various places, and it’s through their partners that they have been able to do the actual work. An organization like CRY needs a lot of support – I think it’s the very basis of humanity that you want children to have a brighter future. That’s really what I hope.
IC: The Indian diaspora in the U.S.– we live in a bit of a bubble. So, when you raise funds here, what would you want us to know about the change that you would like to see with what we contribute?
SA: CRY has many projects, and people have the freedom to choose which aspect they would like to support. There’s a whole range of projects from education to health to the arts and science. This enables the children to pursue what is of interest to them. Also, they have the agency to speak out about what troubles them and what they think are the solutions –it’s an inclusive kind of development. These were things that were a given in my life and I know how much my brother and I benefited from them. That’s what I would like for all children to have.
IC: You have been a social activist for the longest time. You’ve mentioned in interviews that art should be used as an instrument for social change. Can art not be just for art’s sake?
SA: It can, most certainly. But the kind of upbringing I had, this was what was given to me. It was almost like a process of osmosis – I realized this [art for social change] more and more through my parents’ values, and also through the roles that I was doing. Because, you know, it’s not possible after a while to treat your work like a nine-to-six job and say that all right, I’ll do it and go back to my air-conditioned life and comfort and not concern myself with the people I represent. You owe them. If you have represented them, then you have to make some contribution to help get them closer to where they want to be.
There are absolutely people who think that art is just a medium of entertainment and nothing else. That’s fine, as long as you redefine entertainment. It doesn’t have to be crass. It doesn’t have to be vulgar.
I feel that each of us has the ability to be a catalyst for change. Most of the time we want to help, but we feel the problem is so large, what am I going to be able to do? Well, if you take one step and then another step, that’s how it happens; every drop in the ocean is important. In India, for instance, the relationship that we have with our domestic help on the one hand is so intimate and yet on the other, it’s so hierarchical. They leave their children and their homes to come and clean your house and look after your children. So the least you can do is ask them, where is your child studying. Surely each one has the ability to send one child to school. That is the least we can do.
IC: In an interview, you said that actors are perennial observers of the human condition. You shared an example of how you observed an acquaintance and her mannerisms, when she had just experienced the death of a close one.
Through your activism, what have you observed that you feel you have imbibed in your art, that you wouldn’t have been able to, if you hadn’t had that exposure?
SA: You know, for an artist, your resource base has to be life. So if you are deeply connected with life and people, you are enriching your art. If your experiences are limited, you will be a limited artist. I think this is particularly true for an actor. An actor is her own instrument. See, if you are a musician, then your art will depend upon the dexterity of your fingers, plus the state of the instrument that you are playing. But an actor has only her own emotions, her own experience. So she must try and expand herself consciously. One shouldn’t be frightened of getting bored. I go to art exhibitions and sometimes I can’t understand anything! Koi baat nahin. It’s the exposure is important. That’s how you expand, and when you expand, then you give it to your character.
IC: The Netflix show Adolescence has garnered a lot of attention. What moved me as a mother was how they were able to come at such a complex subject from both perspectives, the child’s and the parents’. As a layman, I think making films about children must be the hardest because adults are doing the storytelling. Do you think Indian films do justice to children? Do we try to tell their stories at all, or can we do better?
SA: Of course, we can do better. We can do better in telling stories of women. We can do better in telling the stories of the Dalits. However, what has changed now is that the awareness [in India] of children’s rights when they’re on stage or when they’re working in film has grown. And I think that should be a given.
IC: I can’t make a very long list of Indian films that are about children in an authentic way. Am I right in my observation?
SA: Yes, you are right. There are ikka dukka (a few) films. But first, for children to look like children is an impossible exercise. I think probably Masoom was a film where the children really looked like children and not like precocious adults. But change is definitely happening.
I think the wonder of a child’s mind and the imagination of a child must never be polluted. As an adult, if you still have childlike curiosity, you have a lot to look forward to.
IC: Speaking of Indian cinema, does the term “Bollywood” bother you?
SA: Of course! It’s sad, you see, because it suggests that all of Indian cinema is just an imitation of Hollywood. Now, it’s sort of a given that Bollywood means the nachne-gane wali films [song and dance films]. To term all of Indian cinema as Bollywood is not fair and not true.
IC: So you have done films everywhere, be it Hollywood or Bollywood. Now there’s a new crop of filmmakers emerging who are immigrants or born and raised in the U.S. There’s a new Indian American storytelling emerging. You did a film called Kaali Khuhi by Terrie Samundra who is from India and the U.S. How is it working with stories from within our community?
SA: It is very heartwarming. It cannot be only the West’s point of view imposed on the East. As the world shrinks and becomes a global village, it becomes extremely important that the wind blows both ways. And that opportunity is coming our way. When I was doing Steven Spielberg’s HALO, for instance, it was a microcosm of the world; there were Americans, Canadians, Asians, Koreans, and it wasn’t even an issue. Fifteen years ago, we would have been a strange kettle of fish. For a long time, Asian actors have been asking for color-blind casting. When I did HALO I was not asked to change my accent or lighten my hair. It was completely color blind– that is something that Asian actors have been struggling for for a very long time.
IC: Do you think diaspora stories will eventually evolve from being mostly about arranged marriages?
SA: We have identity struggles, but I think we have to move beyond that. Identity struggle is very important, but other issues can be talked about. The fact that we are from the diaspora should inform the film we are doing, but it doesn’t have to be only about identity.
IC: Congratulations on your successful Netflix series Dabba Cartel. Are we going to see a second season?
SA: I hope so!
IC: In the final episode of the series, your character says to her daughter-in-law, “Yeh ghar-grihasti ki zindagi tumhare liye hai Raji, mere liye nahin…” [This domestic life is for you, Raji, not for me]. It’s such a truth that few want to confront– that not every woman is cut out for domesticity.
In the U.S. there’s a lot of talk about having larger families and women giving birth to more children. So I wondered if it was blasphemous for a woman to say domesticity is not for her.
What does feminism mean to you in this current world?
SA: Equal opportunity. I accept that men and women are different. I’m not saying better or worse, but different. And that difference needs to be embraced in finding solutions to all problems that for too long have been seen only from the male point of view. So if we are holding up half the sky, our voice has to be included. Now, when girls say, ‘oh I’m not a feminist’, they say as if it’s an accusation. It’s still associated with the bra burning phase. Look at where the women’s movement has reached all over the world and how much easier it is for us because they have walked the way and made place for us.
How can you not be a feminist? I don’t think it’s only about women. It’s also about men. I know a lot of men who are feminists; my husband for one is a feminist and so was my father. Even amongst the directors, the Shyam Benegal gaze was one where the Yin and Yang were balanced perfectly. [Feminism] is an ideology that is necessary for the progress of society.
IC: The elephant in the room is artificial intelligence in filmmaking. Is this something you even think about? Are you seeing AI happening in the Indian film industry?
SA: It’s in your face, so how can you not think about it. There are doomsday predictions about what it’s going to do to cinema. I think we have to embrace it. There is no other way. We cannot resist it. You can’t resist technology, right?
So you have to see how you can make it a collaborator rather than an enemy. When it comes to artists, even now, we feel that artificial intelligence has not yet been able to replace emotion, and it is emotion that lights the flame in any artist. Some say it’s [AI] is wishful thinking, some say it’s dire, but it’s here and you’re better off embracing it.
IC: I have to ask you about your first trip to the Cannes Film Festival when you were miffed that they required women to wear heels on the red carpet. Did you end up wearing heels?
SA: I was so cross, oh my god! I have been with three films to Cannes and at that time I don’t think I used to wear heels. I wrote a letter to them about it. How can they do this? Cannes is a very good festival because of the market and the ability to watch cinema. Now somehow it’s turning to be about the red carpet and everything that you are wearing; I can understand that because there are so many brands selling their wares through this and the whole world is becoming commercialized. But I think if some of us can just stay truthful to cinema without the taam-jhaam of the red carpet, then everybody gets a real chance to see something incredible.
So no, I didn’t wear heels. I used to wear Kolhapuri chappals with saris!