Unhappy families I was born in Delhi, in 1983, to a Punjabi family. We lived in a big house in a posh area of south Delhi. Although it was big, my parents and I lived in just one room. My mum made a small kitchen within the room and there was a bathroom. My father’s parents and his younger brother and his wife lived in the rest of the house.
My uncle wanted my dad, mum and me out so they could have (a larger) stake in the property. They would cut off the water and electricity to our room. My uncle and his wife were very aggressive. One bad night, when I was 12, they charged in with a torch – they wanted to burn my mother. We escaped that night and moved to a small apartment on the outskirts of Delhi.
The hustle For my parents, there was shame attached to living in a small flat. For me, those years, from the age of 12 to 20, were the best in my life because I had a community of friends. Living in that big house on a road of mansions, I had no life. Here, we knew everyone. I grew up wanting to buy a house for my parents. That was my only ambition in life.
Mum did multiple jobs to pay for my education. She did tuition at home and bought products wholesale and sold them for small margins. I started working early. Aged 16, I was Delhi’s second lady DJ. I earned 400 rupees (HK$45) an hour. I was a go-getter. I used to sell Laughing Cow cheese in markets. I hustled.
Backstage pass My best friend’s mother was a production coordinator for English-language films shot in India. I was still at college, studying mass communication, when I started as an intern at the film company. I progressed quickly to production coordinator, production manager and then location manager.
In three to four years, I became the most sought-after service producer. Aged 20, I was handling big productions and taking on more and more responsibility because it would pay more. I would work overnight. I was very hungry, very curious to learn. By the time I was 21, I wanted to be a producer.
Not cricket My parents made some money and we moved back to south Delhi, but we were renting. Our neighbour had US$100,000 and wanted to open a studio to make baby videos and, as I’d finished studying, wanted me to help set it up. I don’t know where I got the confidence, but I said, “You should give me the US$100,000 and I will go to Bombay and make a feature film.” I had no idea. I was street-smart, but I didn’t know Bombay or how to start. I met a bunch of shady people and then I met a director who also had access to US$100,000 and we made a children’s cricket film, Say Salaam India.
This was in the lead-up to the 2007 Cricket World Cup and we thought we could use the marketing around it to promote our movie. The day my film was released, India was knocked out in the first round. All the cinema owners said to us, “If we play a cricket movie now, our cinemas will be burned down.”
Finding an audience I didn’t want to go back home. I felt a huge responsibility to my neighbour who had given me the money. I went to my old school in Delhi, Bluebells School International, and asked the principal whether the students might pay US$1 to see my movie. I booked a cinema and 1,000 of the 2,000 students came. The kids were excited about the film; it spoke to them. The principal gave me a letter of appreciation, which I took to the biggest school in Delhi, which has 25,000 kids, and orchestrated 20 shows. Then I (got university students) involved in helping to organise screenings. Over nine months we put on 350-plus shows and I made all the money back for my investor.
Song for Mum I got a call from an actor saying he had a bucket-list movie, 10 things to do before you die. It was about an innocent guy who had never drunk alcohol or smoked, who got stomach cancer. I loved the script, so I founded my company, Sikhya Entertainment, and we made the film Dasvidaniya (2008). There was a song in it called O Maa, Meri Maa, Pyaari Maa, Mumma. That was for my mum. She was very proud of it.
By that time she was very ill. She had cancer of the throat. She passed away in July 2008 and the film was released that November. A year before she died, I’d raised enough money to buy a house in south Delhi. It was still being built and wasn’t ready to live in yet. My entire life was about the day we would have our own house, and everything would be OK. Both my parents passed away before we took possession. My father died six months after my mother, from a heart attack in the night.
Movie montage I didn’t know what to do after that. I slept for a week, then a friend told me about a studio that was looking for a head of production. I moved to Bombay lock, stock and barrel, and left Delhi forever. I sold the house and threw myself into work. I was head of production for a million-dollar Hindi-language movie, Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai (2010). Every day there was a crisis.
At the studio I met the writer/director Anurag Kashyap. I worked for him for five years and built his company, Anurag Kashyap Films. We produced 20 independent movies. He would select scripts and I would make them. He thought the films would do well internationally but didn’t know how to crack the market, so I started travelling to festivals in Paris, London and New York. I took the cheapest flights with crazy layovers, slept on people’s couches and showed up for meetings. I did that for five years and built up a solid network. Pushing independent Indian films was my mission. We had nine films at Cannes, 14 at the Toronto Film Festival and four at Sundance. In 2014, Anurag decided to shut the company.
Oscar worthy I wasn’t clear where I stood. I felt isolated. I had never addressed the loss of my parents and now it hit me hard. It was a burnout, it was depression. I shaved my head and followed a guru and did meditation and prayer. It really grounded me and made me believe in myself. In 2016, I bounced back to making movies. A highlight was producing Period. End of Sentence.
It started when girls at Oakwood School in Los Angeles and their English teacher, Melissa Berton, heard about girls in India and third-world countries dropping out of school when they began menstruating. They wanted to donate money for a pad machine, and make a movie to raise awareness. The 26-minute film was shot over two weeks.
Period drama: how Asian women broke the menstruation taboo
That it went all the way to getting nominated for an Oscar was a dream. That it won (for Best Documentary – Short Subject) was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Getting the biggest award in the industry has been the most amazing, magical experience. It has put the conversation on the map.
The film was launched in 190 countries and is on Netflix. It has empowered me in my process of storytelling, and it has empowered the girls involved. It has been exciting to see the impact.
Guneet Monga was in Hong Kong to speak at an Asian University for Women benefit.
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