Interview: Willard Carroll

From Sean Connery to Salman Khan. Willard Carroll explains the whys and hows to Pratim D. Gupta

You showed the first look of Marigold in June 2005 at the Amsterdam IIFA. The film is releasing in August 2007. What took so long?
It took around two years to get the finances together for the film. Making the movie was more of a breeze. Just getting the money for such an ambitious project took some time. The movie was never made with a certain time period in mind. So there’s no fear of it looking dated.

Why would someone like you, having made Playing By Heart with Sean Connery, Angelina Jolie and Dennis Quaid, want to make a Bollywood film with Salman Khan?
I fell in love with the movies here. All the projects that I have done come from a very personal space. I loved this place and these movies so much that I wanted to find a way to communicate my enthusiasm to an American audience who had never seen a Bollywood movie and would never necessarily come to India.

Which are these Bollywood movies that floored you in the first place?
The first movie that I saw here was actually Chori Chori Chupke Chupke. It was, of course, the first Salman film that I saw. Other movies that I watched were Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam, which is probably my favourite because I find the film so beautiful. I find the emotions of the films here so compelling. So I wanted to do that, but I did not want to make an imitation Bollywood movie. Not a parody. I wanted it to be as real as possible. I wasn’t poking fun at it. I wanted to look at Bollywood in an affectionate way.

You making the movie must have automatically given it a very different feel...
Exactly. The first half of the movie is more comic. You know about the making of a film in Bollywood and all that happens behind the screen. The second half is more of a family-oriented comedy drama. The idea was to make it something that all kinds of audiences could follow very easily. I have always found Marigold to be the Indian equivalent of Under The Tuscan Sun. A woman travels and has her life transformed by travelling and finding love. Yes, Bollywood is a big part of it but you don’t have to know Bollywood to appreciate or follow the film.

Besides yourself and Ali Larter, there’s hardly any cast or crew from the West...
That was the idea. Since I am in many ways introducing Bollywood to the West, I wanted to use all the talent from here. I didn’t want to fly down a Hollywood crew to shoot the movie. So the cameraman, the production designer, the dance directors, the music directors are all from here. Because I wanted it to be authentic. Also I could have a short hand with all these people who have done it before. They saved me from potential disasters many times.

What was it like to actually go and shoot a song-and-dance sequence?
(Laughs) It was actually the most fun I have had on the sets of a movie because I have never done anything like that. The first song-and-dance sequence that we shot was only in the third week and it was the finale of the movie, having almost the entire cast. It had horses, elephants... It was this overwhelmingly big thing... And I had an actress (Ali Larter) who has never done this before! It was really invigorating. Yes, I did think: “What have I got myself into?” It was ultimately fun because otherwise it was not worth it.

And the hero just had to be Salman...
Yes it had to be Salman. I mean I wrote it for him. He was part of the project from the very first day. I based the character on his personality. Then I looked for someone who would be visually complimentary and also contrast in terms of personality. Ali really had that.

How did you find the Indian crew?
Oh, wonderful. Besides Salman, who was very generous, Anil Mehta, my cinematographer, was very supportive. Of course I had done my homework. I was not bullshitting people. Come on, I had watched Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam six times! It helped that they could understand I was genuine about my feelings for the industry.

It will be an all-new experience for the West but what is in Marigold for us Bollywood junkies?
For Indian viewers I think it will be fun to see a different take on a movie like this. Because a lot of these cross-cultural movies have taken cheap shots at Bollywood and tried to be kitschy or not tried to be kitschy but ended up looking kitschy. Hopefully the honesty of Marigold will appeal to people.