A rebellious daughter, her gentle admirer, her hypocritical father, his muse.
O Rangreza, a drama that incorporates all these elements into one, and is currently one of Pakistan's favourite television dramas.
Sajal
Aly plays the role of unapologetic and unabashed Sassi, who wants to
become an actress, just like star Sonia Jehan (Sana Fakhar) whom her
father, a poet named Khayaam Saani (Noman Ijaz), had always admired.
Qasim (Bilal Abbas) is Sassi’s cousin who is terribly, irrevocably in
love with Sassi and is nothing like her father. He is, in fact, like her
mother (Irsa Ghazal, playing the role of Mumtaz): quiet, soft-spoken
and gentle-natured.
There is a credible sense of gender role reversal: it is the
female lead who is strong and unrepentant. When men take charge, they
often mess up. It is a refreshing sight indeed, amidst the constant
stream of weeping damsels in distress on television, to see a woman
follow her ambition that is not centered around marriage or divorce or
similar tropes. We caught up with the writer, Saji Gul, who created
these characters and their powerfully different story.
Images: O Rangreza
has a powerful female protagonist. Talk to us about the process of
crafting this character. Is this character based on someone you know?
Saji Gul (SG):
I can't say that I’ve based Sassi on one person but I’ve seen Sassi in
many women around me. Society rejects and doesn’t accept women like
Sassi. She has always been there, she just never had the mainstream
focus or spotlight of a big drama.
This is why people
are surprised to see it, amazed to see the things that she does. Sassi
is every woman that has been a victim of male hypocrisy. She is every
woman who is told that she can't do what a man can do. The same rules
that apply to women, don’t apply to men.
In my thesis
years, when I was studying at NCA, I had written a piece like this with
four blocks. It charts the story of a girl who tries to become what her
father loves, but her father does not accept her in that role. She tries
to become what her brother approves in women but she realises, again,
that her brother chooses a different standard for another woman, say his
girlfriend, and a different standard for his own sister.
The
same cycle repeats with her husband and her son. While I’m talking to
you, though, something just occurred to me. I realised that I may have
also based Sassi on a woman about whom I had heard – she wanted to learn
kathak and she wasn’t able to. Her father had disapproved, her
brothers had disapproved of her dancing and when she got married, her
husband and children had also disapproved. So when she was sixty, she
began dancing.
Images: How difficult is it to
adapt a character for television? It’s a different character and story
on paper but when actors, directors and producers give their own input,
the characters and stories of these characters take a different turn.
SG:
It’s very difficult to write for television sometimes. Sometimes, this
one character is meant for just four or five episodes but when a certain
actor does it in a certain way, you simply can’t let go of it. Sonia
Jehan, for example (a muse for one of the play’s protagonists played by
Sana Fakhar), was simply a muse and restricted to the screen. But the
character kept getting bigger and more crucial.
When
you’re writing a novel, a writer has more freedom. You can get as
fantastical as you want. As a screenwriter, you have to imagine the
whole scene. You have to understand the limitations and the different
situations that a production may face. For example, in a novel the
character may go into many introspections. For television, it can get
boring.
For Mammo (Irsa Ghazal’s character, a demure,
soft-spoken mother to a firecracker), when she dresses up and sees
Khayyam – she is laughed at. All that had to be shown by action and by
visual aids. I am slightly facilitated by this because I’ve studied
visual arts so I can think in terms of colour and background of my
characters and my stories and their symbols.
Television
doesn’t just include writing or dialogues – it includes dance and music
and architecture and so many other art forms that come together to
produce one finished result. Sometimes, when you bring a creation from
paper to screen, there can be a generation loss. But sometimes, actors
and production can amplify the characters as well. The way Sajal has,
for Sassi.
When a character reaches TV screens, it's because it has some truth to it that has had the power to travel. We can’t dismiss stories saying that, “Oh since I’ve never seen this happen, therefore it is impossible, therefore it never exists” – things and events and people exist beyond our experiences. The more people accept new ideas, the more courage production houses will take to create off-beat stories.
Images: Tell me more about Sassi. You talked about
male hypocrisy. The play has a conversation about male hypocrisy but in
Pakistani dramas it always has this conversation in a regressive way.
Sassi is often victimised by the same male hypocrisy – but she is
unapologetic. She takes it head on and takes charge of the situation and
moves on. What was it like, writing for Sassi? Did men excommunicate
with you over this?
SG: I
remember attending a conference once where we talked about how
strong-headed female characters have always come from men’s written
works. Ankahi, Shehzori, Manto’s stories, Mumtaz
Mufti’s heroines – they’ve all written amazingly strong women who have
revolted against the patriarchal status quo.
As a
nation, I think we’re sort of addicted to self-pity. Sometimes, I don’t
know if it is some function of self-pity, but it seems that women may
have some kind of wishful thinking to find a straying husband whom they
want to win back.
You would be surprised that it was
mostly women who took an issue with Sassi: “How could she disobey her
father like that!” Even though they are seeing how ridiculously the
father is flaunting the code and marrying another woman, he is breaking
every boundary there is. It is now that Sassi’s critics have started to
understand her position.
Every story stands on conflict.
And the most interesting conflict is when the story itself conflicts
with the audience. They come at odds with the character itself that hey,
I didn’t think this character would act this way. But it did. How, how
do I understand this?
As far as men are concerned, they
can see Qasim. He’s not a man who wants to imprison Sassi. Normally men
want to conquer women and show their machismo by telling the world that
they’ve finally broken a woman into submission.
People
may think Qasim controlling Sassi is victory. But many times, bravery is
to let go. Masculinity isn’t about always winning. It is about
tolerance and also to respect a woman even when a man is in a position
of power.
Images: How difficult was it to pitch
the idea to networks and production houses? Generally, when it comes to
dramas in the past ten years, the emotion of self-pity currency has the
highest rate. Sassi, in the past ten to twelve episodes, she has barely
indulged in self-pity. Did you have any fears writing this? She’s sort
of a radical heroine, with respect to the past decade of regression in
Pakistani dramas. Did you think people would accept this girl?
SG:
It took me two to three years to bring this script to the screen. It’s
an entire struggle which you have to fight. Ever since this system of
ratings and meters has come in, drama and screenwriting and television
has become a lot like teachers and students. The idea is now to become
solely entertainers. Teachers nowadays have to keep children entertained
at all times, instead of actually trying to teach them something.
Perhaps the writers of yore were freer than us. Reactions reached them
much later than they reach us now.
The art forms of
today, especially in television, is a commodity. People focus on what
the end user will say, instead of what you have written. So you are
usually afraid for something new and groundbreaking. If I pitch a story
like, “Oh yeah so this story is like Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam” a
production house might accept it more readily rather than if I tell them
a story that has never been heard before. And it becomes even more
risky because you are financially dependent on this work. When I started
working on this script, I left all the jobs that I was doing and
focused on this script.
Images: How are you feeling now? The drama is a hit.
SG:
Mashallah, the feedback is great. What’s interesting is that I’m
getting positive from all kinds of socio-economic backgrounds. From all
kinds of educational backgrounds as well. I’m not saying that I’m some
great flagbearer of change. But maybe the success of O Rangreza will open more paths and avenues for ‘different’ scripts.
Images: Do you have any message for critics, future and present writers, for audiences, for viewers?
SG:
Don’t try to play god with your characters. There were many moments
when Sassi challenged my own concepts and sensibilities as a man.
But
I often say this example – when an observer is filming a habitat for
National Geographic – if a turtle flips on its shell, the observer won’t
change that. The same way, when we are writing a character, who is,
let’s say not a Muslim – we can’t make them say things that we would
say, if we are Muslim. We can’t impose our own thoughts and ideas as
writers on the characters.
As far as writing about women
is concerned, we know that even in the most orthodox of societies, the
norms are always flexible for women. And no matter how strict the value
system is, the situation is always movable for men. And women suffer
from internalised misogyny and help enforce these strict rules for
fellow women.
As audiences, we also need to be a little
more open to understand stories. When a character reaches the television
screens, it is because it has some truth to it that has had the power
to travel. We can’t dismiss stories saying that, “Oh since I’ve never
seen this happen, therefore it is impossible, therefore it never exists”
– things and events and people exist beyond our experiences.
And
we should be open to understanding and interpreting these experiences
with an open mind because the more people accept new ideas and
experimental projects, the more courage production houses will take to
create off-beat stories and newer, more innovative storylines.
