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Hello, Deepa Mehta, it's--
thank you for taking the time to speak with me today.
For kids who don't know you, you are a screenwriter,
director, producer, with decades of experience
and your movies have been shown at film festivals
all around the world.
You've been nominated for an Oscar before
and your new movie,
is getting lots of
So I want to talk to you today about lessons you learned
in your career that might help kids who aspire
to be content creators,
but first, for kids in Canada who may not have heard of you,
I was hoping to throw some rapid fire questions at you
as a way to kind of help them get to know you better.
Are you down for that?
Absolutely.
So how would you describe yourself as a kid?
Were you naughty or nice?
I don't remember exactly what I was,
but I remember my parents telling me,
especially my mother saying that I was a very curious kid.
I always, I used to drive her nuts
because I always wanted to know why.
I was really, maybe, slightly obnoxious,
but very curious.
Saara:
Do you prefer watching movies at a private screening
or at a crowded theatre?
There's a magic that happens when you watch a movie
with the audience and it's a shared experience
and I love that and I love the popcorn
and whatever goes with it.
Speaking of snacks, would you rather spend
the rest of your life in Hollywood or Bollywood,
and who has the better snacks?
Ah, well, neither for me.
I don't want to be in Hollywood.
I don't want to be in Bollywood.
I've had an experience of both,
I really like being in Canada.
But definitely in, when I go to theatres in Delhi,
for example, I love the snacks more,
because you get Samosas and I love Samosas
and you know, you don't get them here.
You just released a movie about a boy growing up gay
during the Sri Lankan civil war,
[speaking alternate language]
Is it wrong for a boy to do it?
Why? Are you hurting anybody?
We're going to talk about that in a minute,
but first, I'm curious to hear your thoughts
on the way content is being created.
What do you think about the kind of content that's
being produced for social media platforms like
YouTube, TikTok,
I'm not into
and I do know is that a little bit on
is that young people have an opportunity to actually,
to create something, whether it's the way they,
how they perceive, whether it's a dish
or whether they perceive wearing clothes or what they think
of a certain film or a book, they can do it.
What tips would you pass along to young creators
who want their work to have an impact?
One of the things that I think is extremely important
for young people is, is curiosity.
Never take anything for granted
always ask why and research it.
Why is it happening?
Why does it interest you?
Why does, you know, why does, the sun rising,
I'm just taking a silly... [indiscernible]
Why is that more interesting than being in darkness?
That curiosity is what drives creativity for me.
That for me is very important.
Curiosity is what drives all creativity.
Saara:
Would you do vlogs to camera like, you know, your daily life
or whatever you may be doing?
Or would you do silly made up skits?
I think I'd do silly made up skits. That's fun.
Saara:
with a stunt King called
or a makeup artist called
Oh, the stunt guy or woman?
Definitely.
Yeah.
I don't know much about that, you know, that's, that's great.
That would be wonderful. How wonderful.
Is there somebody like that?
Yeah. His name is called MrBeast.
Deepa:
because I think he sounds fascinating.
MrBeast:
I watched your new movie,
and it's about a boy who's figuring out that he's gay.
It's also about conflict between Tamil and Sinhalese people.
Um, and there has been a bit of backlash., I've seen.
Some people are criticizing you for not
casting more Tamil actors in the lead roles.
They say that the actors can't even speak
the Tamil language correctly...
How do you respond to this?
There's a big difference between tokenism and representation.
I will never cast you, Saara,
because you're a token brown person in my film
I'll cast you because you're the right person,
the right colour and the right talent for my film.
So tokenism is something I do not believe in.
How do you think the gay storyline will be received
in places that may not be as open
to LGBTQ plus relationships?
You know, LGBTQ is a reality.
Gay people are a reality and they own the world
as much as you and myself or so-called straight people own.
It's, it's, it's the world, the world belongs
to different people and it's really important
and I think that's, that's great,
you have an opportunity for them to see, hey, of course,
love knows no boundaries.
That's what's important.
Thank you so much for taking the time.
My pleasure.