Mumbai Diary: Friday Dossier

Pic/Shadab Khan

She's got the look

A woman exercising at an open gym in Bandra's Bandstand is watched over by strays getting a sun bath.

A breakthrough from Britain

The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) runs a programme called BAFTA Breakthrough, which seeks to provide support to creative professionals from four countries - the US, UK, India and China. The list of 10 people chosen from India this year features Mumbaikars including actor-cum-comedian Sumukhi Suresh (in pic, below)and music director Alokananda Dasgupta (above). The former told this diarist, "The programme is aimed at exposing the 10 of us to contacts within the industry and the BAFTA network. They will contact us about our future plans, and have impactful conversations with us." Dasgupta added, "I was looking to work with like-minded people [from abroad] and this programmme will hopefully give me the opportunity to do that - meet people, exchange ideas and instead of working in a hierarchy, work with people, not for them."

The right rhyme

Ranjit Hoskote has reason to celebrate. The city-based poet has been chosen as the recipient of this year's Mahakavi Kanhaiyalal Sethia Award for Poetry, which carries a cash prize of '1 lakh. "I was quite overcome when I first got the news, because firstly it's named after an author whose contribution to Hindi and Rajasthani literature is immense. Also, I have great admiration for the people who have received it before, and it feels wonderful to be part of that narrative," Hoskote told us.

Going around in loops in Vikhroli

This diarist has found out that Mumbaikars can soon have a loopy time with an installation that's coming up at Godrej The Trees in Vikhroli. Sculptor Manish Nai's monumental structure in aluminium and steel was completed a couple of days ago. Titled Zero, the long and winding tube-like formation is 10 feet long and 54 feet wide. Speaking about his inspiration, Nai shared, "It was conceived on a white sheet of paper like an entangled mass of wires. De-constructing the idea and building it on the ground in 3-D took [three] years of effort. We did a wooden mock-up to precisely check for the actual size in scale, and then, the structure was made using aluminum and steel."

This literary duo is booked at a museum

Ahalya Naidu (left) and Meethil Momaya at Bandra's Trilogy Library and Bookstore

The Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalya (CSMVS) recently launched a bookshop, and the museum has chosen Meethil Momaya and Ahalya Naidu to curate the titles there for the first year. The duo run Bandra's beloved Trilogy Library and Bookstore, and speaking about their plans at CSMVS, Naidu shared, "We have been putting together a collection of books that is in sync with the museum's founding principles, the range and character of the various special exhibitions planned for this year, and for the unbelievably amazing breadth of the collection of objects there."

Silver lining

The pandemic has been a tumultuous time for teachers who were forced to conduct online classes instead of physical ones. Many found it difficult to adapt to the technology required for that shift, which is what is highlighted in a film that writer-director Sameer Sharma made for an e-learning app. It features a teacher (Raghubir Yadav) contemplating retirement after struggling to cope with online classes, but being convinced by his students not to do so. The film has now won the silver prize for direction at the prestigious Spikes Asia Award, based in Singapore. "My own inability when I first started working on computers came to my mind [while making the film], and also how difficult it was for people like my father to adapt to the online world with Zoom calls, etc," Sharma shared.