It’s homecoming for documentary film maker Miriam Joseph. Having traversed to different corners of the world, producing documentaries for the BBC and other media houses, followed by seven years as Executive Producer (EP) of Excel Entertainment in Mumbai, credited with producing films like Don , Rock On , Luck By Chance , Karthik Calling Karthik, Don2 …to name a few, Miriam called it quits when she got the top job as CEO. “By the end my job became less about films. As EP on a film I could travel, meet interesting people; as CEO it became a job about salary, overtime, leave etc. and that’s not me. By then we also had enough trained people,” she says on her decision to move at a career high, from Mumbai, to her riverside home in Aluva.
It was in the 90s, while she was immersed in work in London, that her mother had called excitedly telling her about buying her an apartment by a river in Kochi. Miriam had no idea then about the beauty of her home overlooking the Periyar. Today, sitting in her bright living room filled with tranquillity reflected off the green-blue waters below she is completing work on the Kerala leg of a BBC documentary series, True Grit , on four retired world class sportsmen mastering four ancient sports and competing among themselves. She did the research on Kalari and was the local producer for the programme.
Her association with the BBC began per chance in London and has been long. Having grown up between Zambia, where her parents worked, and boarding school in Ooty, Miriam graduated from Jaipur University and moved to London to study film. Always keen to be in production, she got her first chance when BBC, having bought the rights of Ramanand Sagar’s Mahabharat , needed a translator for sub-titles. With occasional help of an expert and her knowledge of Hindi, Miriam proved her merit with quality work. With that she had herself on board with the media house for the next 14 years training with them in production of Current Affairs and Documentary. Her next stint was as a freelancer when she made documentaries for ITV, Channel 4 and 5. Some of her documentaries that she recalls vividly, because of the wealth of experience she gained from them, were on the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty made on 50 years of Indian Independence, a TV series - Stones of the Raj - with William Dalrymple and The Forgotten Volunteers on the Indian Army in WWII . “I discovered a lot of things about India sitting in London,” says Miriam. For the dynasty series she interacted with global personalities like former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and the former Russian president Mikhail Gorbachev. She met ex-spies; Intelligence Services personnel, historians amongst others, revelling every moment in her work. “I loved what I did,” she says. One of her documentaries on recreational drug use had publishers encouraging her to pen the story. This resulted in her writing two books- Ecstasy and Speed .
But it was feature films that Miriam had set out to do in the beginning. She moved to Mumbai where she learnt the ropes of living in the city while working in an ad firm. It was not easy but she continued to do outsourced work for the BBC. Bollywood in 2001, when Miriam came there, was still unorganised in its functioning, when it was suddenly given industry status. With it came a need for big change in the way production houses worked. She began receiving consultancy offers. “Suddenly, there was financial scrutiny, which required feasibility and budget packages.” Farhan Akhtar and Ritesh Sidhwani of Excel Entertainment brought her on board as EP. The first film she did was blockbuster Don and the next seven years Miriam raised the bar, so to speak, of Bollywood film production. “The company became known for high quality production values, and that’s what I had set out to do,” says Miriam justifying her current move.
By this time she had had her fill of Mumbai. “It’s a city with four and half trees left…it’s become toxic,” she says. Her tranquil pad in Aluva inspires her. She has many ideas but the must drawing is her desire to be an independent filmmaker.
Though being away from her roots in Kerala, Miriam has closely kept in touch with the affairs of the State and growth of the film industry here. She is impressed at the maturity of Malayalam films being made. “The average Malayali writer treats his audience as an adult. I like the fact that filmmakers here make stories about ordinary people, and that’s because they have interesting stories,” she says.
