Living without knowing whether we were ever enough is a cross many people carry far longer than they should. It is the theme that runs through two completely different stories that were told over the past two weeks. JioHotstar’s Love Always was a love story about second chances and how freedom to walk out of a relationship is as important as being in one. John Doe, which hit screens on Friday, is a police procedural about a group of people who try their best to exorcise the voices in their heads that penalise them for being themselves. One thing in common between Love Always and John Doe is director Madhumita, who helmed both the series and the film. “Now that you mention it, both Love Always and John Doe does deal with the idea of ‘Naan Podhuma’ and I am someone who has been constantly fighting with that concept,” begins Madhumita by revealing that this identity crisis of sorts happened to her during her college days. “It came from a professor during my college days. In fact, at one point, he said I’d never become a filmmaker, and never succeed in life.”
Despite becoming a filmmaker in 2008 with Vallamai Thaarayo, and winning national and international awards for her 2019 film, KD, Madhumita admits that voice never left her head. “Say, we are in a shooting location, everything is planned to the minute details, and shot breakdowns are ready. But if I’m in a spot of bother or I can't figure out what to do next, I can still hear his voice. So, John Doe is one such voice that keeps on reiterating to people that they are inadequate,” says Madhumita, who was very clear that the film shouldn’t be just another investigation thriller. The same clarity went behind making Love Always, which wasn’t your run-of-the-mill romantic comedy either.
“Romance is different when you are 15, 25, 50, etc. Every decade, romance feels different, right? That is why, when Manjula from Love Always asks for a divorce from her husband, Kannan, after almost 3-4 decades of marriage, the question is, ‘Why now?’ and she asks… ‘Why not now?' Why should she accept another 10 years just because she agreed to live through the first 30?” asks Madhumita, who wanted to question the stigma surrounding divorce but in a series that treated it with seriousness and levity in equal measure. Crediting the late writer extraordinaire Crazy Mohan for inspiring the humour in her writing, Madhumita quickly asserts that it is impossible to ape him because he was a bonafide genius. “There’s nobody like Crazy Mohan sir. We were adapting a Korean webtoon, and the challenge was adapting it for a Tamil audience. I had worked with sir in Kola Kolaya Munthirikka (2010). We were laughing a lot while filming, but it wasn’t translating into the visuals. That’s when I realised his humour is about reaction rather than the dialogue punches that are being traded. It’s about the setup and the delivery. Our Tamil humour is a lot about wit, sarcasm, wordplay, and the like. As Mohan sir often said… ‘Comedy is not a joke…’ You have to work twice as hard as you would do in action or horror.”
But making John Doe wasn’t a walk in the park for Madhumita, who is quite piqued by the kind of responses she's getting for the thriller with a beating heart. It features Arjun Das and Sanchana Natarajan as no-nonsense cops, and it is an against-the-grain casting considering the kind of roles both have played so far. “If people expect Arjun to play a villain, I want him to play a layered cop, who isn’t your Singam-type mass hero. I did the same with Kaalidhar Laapata, the Hindi remake of KD, by casting Abhishek Bachchan. If I go for the easier choices, I get bored very easily. Both Gouri Kishan and Ramzan Mohammed, in Love Always, were different choices, and it was their first time doing this kind of comedy. Casting makes or breaks a film.”
John Doe marks Madhumita’s return to Tamil cinema since KD. Although she did have Love Always and Prime Video’s Putham Pudhu Kaalai Vidiyaadha (2022), there has been quite a gap between her Tamil theatrical releases. But that doesn’t mean she hasn’t been cooking something in this gap. She helmed a reality comedy show, worked on the Hindi remake of Angamaly Diaries (2017), and is coming up with a hostage drama next, followed by an international creature feature. “Honestly, I am a workaholic. There’s also a crime drama thriller series that will go on floors mid next year. But you can’t go around explaining to everybody that you’ve been keeping busy. I also worked in streaming platforms commissioning projects because I wanted to get a wholesome view of how content is perceived in these places,” says Madhumita, who gets pensive when discussing how this pursuit of excellence has taken a toll on her personal life.
“Sometimes when I think I’m succeeding in this, I fail in my personal relationships,” says a candid Madhumita, adding, “The truth is, even recently, I broke down wondering if all this work would prove I am good enough to do it. I am not a big brand, right? Box office decides everybody’s career, and I am no different. But despite all of this pressure, I still do this because I believe seeing my vision come to life in front of the camera is magic. I believe that telling those stories and taking them to an audience to help them forget their problems is like magic. The work I do is my escape, and I hope the content I create becomes the escape for people,” signs off Madhumita.