When a National Award-winning movie man and globally known jazz critic meet, the exchange goes beyond friendly chat to spirited socio-political dialogue
Sunil Sampat and Saeed Mirza in Sampat’s Bandra home. Pics/Shadab Khan
Saeed Akhtar Mirza, 81, screenwriter and art film director
Sunil Sampat, 81, jazz impresario and author
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A beacon of progressive thought, parallel cinema veteran Saeed Akhtar Mirza’s brilliant oeuvre includes Arvind Desai Ki Ajeeb Dastaan, Albert Pinto Ko Gussa Kyon Aata Hai, Mohan Joshi Haazir Ho! Salim Langde Pe Mat Ro, Naseem, Nukkad and Intezaar. Studying economics and political science at St Xavier’s College, after a diploma in marketing and advertising, he joined the Film and Television Institute of India, Pune, and was later appointed Chairman of the FTII. The son of writer-director Akhtar Mirza, credited with hits like Waqt and Naya Daur, Saeed lectures on cinema in universities in India and America, and is presently Chairman of the KR Narayanan National Institute of Visual Science and Arts in Kerala.
Internationally acknowledged for his authoritative understanding and critiquing of jazz music, Sunil Sampat schooled across India before graduating as a chemical engineer from Syracuse University in New York state. Back in Bombay, he started an engineering company manufacturing speciality equipment in fibreglass for storing and processing aggressive chemicals. He began freelance writing on jazz with Mid-day and Sunday Mid-day, and covered every Jazz Yatra fest from the very first in 1978. Serving on the managing committee of Capital Jazz, helmed by Soli Sorabjee for several years, he is on the NCPA jazz advisory committee from its inception in 2010. Contributing editor with Rolling Stone magazine since its India launch, he owns an enviable record collection. His other passion being cricket, he follows the game keenly.
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Saeed Mirza: Perhaps we met at the invitation of Sunil’s wife Manju to their home for a meeting with the wonderful actor and common friend Tom Alter. Or was it for the reading of a play? It would have been in the 1980s. I was intrigued by Sunil’s chequered interests.
Sunil Sampat: We had a mutual good friend in filmmaker Kundan Shah, who might have introduced us. I was and remain fascinated by the way Saeed analyses life. He picks up on nuances others often miss. His adding fresh perspective and dimension to ordinary, everyday life is unique.
Sunil Sampat and Saeed Mirza
SM: My friend is a free thinker. Unburdened by ideology, yet with a moral code broadly identified as “left”. He never lets the political stand on issues become “fundamentalist”. It is open to change and debate.
SS: Truly a “fundamentalist”, for me the “fun” comes before the “mental”. Seriously, I admire Saeed’s open-mindedness and clarity of expression.
SM: Sunil is extremely methodical: the time of waking up, the walk on Carter Road, when to get to work, arranging a holiday... I’m the opposite, don’t plan ahead into the future. When things happen, they happen.
SS: That is why you’re a creative filmmaker and I’m only a Carter Road walker with your wife Jennifer! Our writing is a binding factor. Saeed encourages me, saying, “Just keep writing. I love the way you think.” His inputs are invaluable.
SM: He is a great raconteur of tales. It’s a pleasure to catch up with Sunil, have a drink, take on the world. I genuinely believe he has his heart in the right place. I love his take on life and general understanding of the world.
SS: We both head out on long, adventurous road trips. Never together, ironically. We do plan to drive to Ooty sometime though. I have driven from Calcutta to Bombay, from Montreal to Acapulco, through Europe, as well as Brazil, the Caribbean, the US and Canada. My wife, daughters and I itch for exciting trips and fortunately enjoy a fair amount of them. Saeed keeps crisscrossing India, almost on impulse, with the imagination and creativity that go into his masterful films.
SM: Now, I am savouring Maharashtra through Karnataka into Tamil Nadu and returning in May via Telangana. And Kerala, of course.
SS: He’s listening to (Ray Charles’) Hit the Road Jack in his car. I was always interested in music. My mother, an accomplished Hindustani classical vocalist, performed at AIR in Nagpur. The love for jazz was sparked as an 11-year-old on hearing a Benny Goodman record. Getting deeper, a decade in the US and Canada gave ample opportunities to cultivate friendships with musicians. In that fabulous period in jazz history, I luckily met legends like John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Clark Terry, Bill Evans, Dizzy Gillespie, Ella Fitzgerald and Carmen McRae, among many others.
SM: Our major love is for the diversity of India, its sub-cultures, languages and religions co-existing for centuries. We share a similar vision of the historical melting pot that is this country, the heritage we have from harmony. And are equally saddened by the stresses impacting this recently. Living in an age of superficiality and with a constipated, constricted viewpoint, we are a crass, crude, macho nation wanting to be poetic. The rule of law doesn’t exist, human rights are secondary. How banana is our republic.
SS: They’ll slip on the banana peel. We have become narrow, nervous and parochial. There has to be a pendulum swing. Sanjay Gandhi’s was dictatorship. This is fascism. Tragically slapstick. As an electorate we continue being insulted.
SM: The anger seething inside each person is steadily fanned, erupting in malice, hate, fear of “the other”. But I believe, even fractured far right, however dented, this too shall pass. The current incredibly bigoted tunnel vision won’t sustain itself.
SS: It is a battle so worth fighting–to preserve the poetry we once had. Considering the Bombay pace of life, Saeed and I stay in touch quite regularly. Each has imbibed the ethos of this city and we build on that strong identity factor.
SM: Bombay is a city in the truest sense of the word for the working man and, particularly, the working woman. Underneath the overt tensions, it retains urbanity and grace.
SS: I feel it’s easier put in perspective this way: let’s say, if we were from Delhi or Chennai, our sensibilities would be different. We are thoroughly blessed to have Bombay in our DNA.
Author-publisher Meher Marfatia writes monthly on city friendships. You can reach her at meher.marfatia@mid-day.com/www.meher marfatia.com
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