Mira Nair

Mira Nair (born 15 October 1957) is an

Mira Nair was born on 15 October 1957 in Rourkela, Orissa, India, and grew up with her two older brothers and parents in Bhubaneswar.^[2] Her father, Amrit Lal Nair, was an officer of the Indian Administrative Service and her mother, Parveen Nayyar, is a social worker who often focused on children.^[3]

She lived in Bhubaneswar until age 18, and attended a convent, following which she left to attend

It’s all in how I do it. Keeping the buns on the seats is very important to me. It requires that ineffable thing called rhythm and balance in movie-making. Foils have to be created, counter-weights. From the intimacy, let’s say, of a love scene to the visceral, jugular quality of war. That shift is something in the editing, how one cuts from the intimate to the epic that keeps you there waiting. The energy propels you.[6]

Nair said to Image Journal in 2017 that she chose directing over any other art form because it was collaborative. "That’s why I am neither a photographer nor writer," she said. "I like to work with people, and my strength, if any, is that. Working with life."^[7]

Documentaries

At the start of her film-making career, Nair primarily made documentaries in which she explored Indian cultural tradition. For her film thesis at Harvard between 1978 and 1979, Nair produced a black-and-white film titled Jama Masjid Street Journal. In the eighteen-minute film, Nair explored the streets of Old Delhi and had casual conversations with Indian locals.^[5]

In 1982, she made her second documentary titled So Far from India, which is a fifty-two-minute film that followed an Indian newspaper dealer living in the subways of New York, while his pregnant wife waited for him to return home.^[3] This film was recognized as a Best Documentary winner at the American Film Festival and New York's Global Village Film Festival.^[5]

Her third documentary, India Cabaret, released in 1984, revealed the exploitation of female strippers in

In 2001, with The Laughing Club of India, she explored laughter based on yoga. Founder Dr. Madan Kararia spoke of the club's history and the growth of laughing clubs across the country, and subsequently the world. The documentary included testimonials from members of the laughter clubs who described how the practice had improved or changed their lives. Its featured segments included a group of workers in an electrical products factory in Mumbai who took time off to laugh during their coffee break.^[8]

Feature films

In 1983 with her friend,

Nair and Taraporevala continued to challenge audiences with the 1991 film Mississippi Masala, which told the story of Ugandan-born Indians displaced in Mississippi.^[3] The film, featuring Denzel Washington, Roshan Seth, and Sarita Choudhury, centers on a carpet-cleaner business owner (Washington) who falls in love with the daughter (Choudhury) of one of his Indian clients. The film revealed the evident prejudice in African-American and Indian communities. Like Salaam Bombay!, the film was well received by critics, earned a standing ovation at the Sundance Film Festival in 1992, and won three awards at the Venice Film Festival.^[5]

Nair went on to direct four more films before she produced one of her most notable films,

A longtime activist, Nair set up an annual film-makers' laboratory, Maisha Film Lab in Kampala, Uganda. Since 2005, young directors in East Africa have been trained at this non-profit facility with the belief that "If we don't tell our stories, no one else will".^[17] Maisha is currently building a school with Architect Raul Pantaleo, winner of Aga Khan Award for Architecture, and his company Studio Tamassociati.^[18]

In 1998, she used the profits from Salaam Bombay! to create the Salaam Baalak Trust which works with street children in India.^[19]

A musical adaptation of Monsoon Wedding, directed by Nair, premiered at the Berkeley Repertory Theatre, running from 5 May to 16 July 2017.^[20][21]

As of 2015, she lives in New York City, where she is an adjunct professor in the Film Division of the School of Arts for Columbia University. The university has a collaboration with Nair's Maisha Film Lab, and offers opportunities for international students to work together and share their interests in film-making.^[22]

In July 2020, journalist

In 1977, Nair met her first husband, Mitch Epstein, when taking photography classes at Harvard University.^[2] They divorced by 1987, and in 1988 Nair met her second husband, the Indo-Ugandan political scientist Mahmood Mamdani, while in Uganda doing research for the film Mississippi Masala. Like his wife, Mamdani teaches at Columbia University.^[3] Their son, Zohran Mamdani, was born in Uganda in 1991. In 2020, Zohran won a seat representing Astoria, Queens in the New York State Assembly after defeating incumbent Assemblymember Aravella Simotas in the Democratic primary election earlier in the year.^[26]

Nair has been an enthusiastic yoga practitioner for decades; when making a film, she has the cast and crew start the day with a yoga session.^[27]

Political views

In July 2013, Nair declined an invitation to the

• India Cabaret (1985) (Documentary)
• My Own Country (1998)
• Hysterical Blindness (2002)

Feature films

Short films

TV series

Awards