Laapataa Ladies goes to Oscars: ‘Kiran and I were just shrieking for 10-15 seconds after hearing the news’ – writer Sneha Desai – Exclusive | Hindi Movie News Filmymeet

Aamir Khan backed and Kiran Rao directed Laapataa Ladies, has gone on to become India’s official entry to the Oscars, beating the likes of Ranbir Kapoor’s Animal, Paravathy’s Ullozhukku, Prithviraj’s The Goat Life and Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine As Light. A major credit for it goes to the writing team of Biplab Goswami ( Story) and Sneha Desai (Screenplay and Dialogues) for how the film finally shaped up.
Now, in an exclusive interview with ETimes, Sneha opens up about the film. Talking about the announcement of the film as India’s entry for the Oscars she said, “ I haven’t had the opportunity to speak to Aamir Sir post the announcement, but Kiran and I did have a couple of calls… we were just shrieking for the first 10-15 seconds when we heard the news.”

“Actually I was at Kiran’s place at the time the announcement came, but Kiran, Tanaji Dasgupta (Executive Producer of Laapataa Ladies and Kindling Productions) and I were jamming on future collaborations, so we all had our phones either on silent or in the bag etc … So, when the meeting got done and all of us were on our way home, we switched the phones on, and there were so many messages and calls and we were like what happened, we immediately called each other! Had we known about the news just 5 minutes back, we would have celebrated the news together!” she added.
Sneha also shared that the announcement has been a great shot in the arm for her. She states, “ Industry insiders definitely want to know about the ones associated with the film, who is the writer, who are the ones who are primarily responsible for how the film has shaped up, etc. I’m sure a lot of insiders are going to sit up and take notice and it is my debut film, and a lot of people are reaching out and trying to put face to my name .. a flurry of activity is happening.”

Sneha also opened up about how she developed Biplab Goswami’s story into a heart-wrenching screenplay. She said, “ His story was a wonderful draft , it was literally served to me on the platter. When you already have content on which some solid work has already been done and submitted to a screenwriting competition (and won),…there is already a lot of meat that you have there.The story already had its tone and tenor, which I kind of changed as it was more preachy and bordering on activism, and the second half of the climax was not so much in place … but I had some wonderful material to begin my work on.”

She also shared that Manju Mai, the character played by Chhaya Kadam, was actually not part of the story written by Biplab, her’s was a last minute addition to the script. She says, “The character of Manju Mai was Kiran’s brainchild , it was not part of Biplab’s script, it was also not part of the first draft also. Kiran felt that we have this shy and reticent Phool , a dynamic and ambitious Jaya ..we needed someone who was a little old, a bit wiser who has gone through the ups and downs of life, and has emerged as a winner, as it was needed to balance out these two women protagonists. And the moment we shaped up the character, we realized there was so much that could be said though her , through her bitterness, through his wisdom , through her age. So Manju Mai became a vehicle for us – whatever preachy lines we had ..we converted it into satire, jibe, humour and taunts … and most of them were hit out of the park by her.”
The film starred Pratibha Ranta, Ravi Kishan, Nitanshi Goel and Sparsh Shrivatava.