Critically acclaimed actor, director and writer Sarmad Sultan Khoosat was behind much of the magic that Humsafar created.
Spotlight caught up with this talented director as he looked back at shooting Humsafar, the moments he remembers well, the painstaking details he took to focus on while shooting the drama and much more. Read on.
There are lots of scenes I remember shooting that brought me a lot of joy…
Every production has its own stress and its own tumultuous remembrances, but overall, in retrospect, it does bring nostalgia back, Sarmad shares while remembering his biggest hit to date.
Quite literally in the physical sense also, the Asher house, where we shot most of the serial – it was not in Karachi. It was in Mirpur. It was on the premises of a new house, it was recently built and Momina thought it would be good to shoot there. And overall, the aesthetic was very clutter free, the house really fitted well into it. It wasn’t overloaded, it had a bare feel to it. Yet not unwarm, I think.
There are lots of scenes I remember shooting that bring me a lot of joy, and I don’t know if that joy translated onto the screen moments (laughs).
For example, my most favorite shot, if I had to choose that one shot in the entire serial is when Mahira is introduced as Khirad and it’s a panning shot. The street and camera pans to the house and we see Mahira putting clothes on the balcony – that shot took hours to shoot.
Shehzad Kashmiri took all the time, he literally had to devise a makeshift appendage for the camera to put it on the right spot and then you know, people have seen Mahira in a million looks and in different avatars by now – but that one look of hers, that lime yellow chicken kurta, I still remember and a white dupatta and her hair with center parting and that kajal in her eyes.
It was one of those moments that I just looked at the monitor and kept looking at it. And I was like, ‘she’s so pretty, she’s so beautiful!” and I thought that was just like watching magic on camera.
And there is another shot in the corridor, where her mother is praying and there’s a conversation between Mahira and her mother and there’s another close up of Mahira – and you know how there’s an idea you have of beauty? That was my idea of perfect beauty captured in shot.
I really remember that zarday ki daig moment, in which Fawad pulls Mahira toward her and says, “Tum bari pyari lag rehi ho” and that was totally improvised.
We all also really enjoyed the rain scenes. It did end on a slightly scary note but Mahira slipped and hurt herself – not too badly but it was still distressing. And there’s an inside joke that there’s a hand outstretched in the rain – that’s not her hand. She couldn’t get up so it wasn’t her hand, it was my hand.
Overall, it was a very filmy sequence, the crew was really geared. They both looked like – I can’t find a better word – it’s magic. That sequence grew on me, while I was editing it, it felt even more romantic than before.
Shooting and editing Humsafar was really full of interesting and sweet surprises. There are a million more. Atiqa was such a joy to work with. Naveen was so enthusiastic and professional. Hina was her perfectionist self. Behroze Bhai, a cool dude to work with. Everyone was there and gave it their all – and it’s rare.
Have you ever looked back on any of the scenes and wished you’d done something differently?
I don’t know if I’d have done something differently, but the thought of redoing them is quite stressful, added Sarmad.
I do wish I had better control of the emotional arc of the story – because when you’re doing it in bits and pieces sometimes it’s very difficult to recall where you left it. So that overall cringe I have about it.
I have never been able to explain it to myself or anyone else but I do establish this odd kind of disconnect with my work. I do recall it but I don’t want to revisit too much. There is a scene where Atiqa has a whole monologue and I felt it was weakly directed. I felt that if it hadn’t had those beautiful, talented actors with whom the audiences had already made a connection, it would have really fallen apart.
Fawad’s accusatory monologue at the end which we had shot in just a few hours – nobody had slept in twenty odd hours and we had many constraints of time and location. It was such an important scene. The actors could have gotten more time with it and I could have spent more time to think about it – but yeah. I don’t know if it was that evident. But yeah, those two scenes really stick out for me.
One quality that Humsafar somehow organically just had – was the innocence
Yaqeen Ka Safar was pretty big. Udaari was also huge. There have been plays that have made a huge impact. I don’t know, I do feel – I might border on philosophical – but things are never arbitrary or random.
They are always in a particular context of time and space. And people are in a certain age or a situation or mood or personalities – even if we all got together and tried to make it again, it won’t be the same.
Sorry, I’m going to be using some grand international references but there hasn’t been another Titanic or another Notting Hill or another Gone with the Wind (laughs).
Sometimes they don’t age well, the techniques start looking dated, the performances, the people, their craft. I reiterate that the idea is not that Humsafar sits with all these greats of the cinema but I’m trying to say is that certain things hold their own significance on their own merit. It always is – when and where it’s done.
One quality that Humsafar somehow organically just had which I also miss in my later or earlier work – was the innocence. This beautiful, sweet innocence about it – the performances looked rough around edges, they weren’t too calculated. It had its own sweet, slow pace around it – and no one deliberately thought about it. And it was a tricky territory around it and it just had hardly four plot points in twenty or so episodes.
We shall someday work together, all of us but it not with that pressure to beat Humsafar…
While talking about the whole cast of Humsafar, Sarmad said, it is so strange that the cast of Humsafar never worked together after that, I don’t know why though. As an ensemble we haven’t worked together.
As a director I’ve worked with all of them together except Noor and Naveen. But Fawad, Mahira, Behroze and Atiqa – I’ve worked with all of them again.
If I had to think about it – there would be that fear – that pressure would be there. I’ll tell you this really sweet anecdote how after the screening of Manto, this elderly lady came up to me and she spoke in Punjabi “Bara tu mainu rulaya puttar… main te Humsafar ke chakkar ich aa gayee aan, ke koi pyaar mohabbat ala film banai hoi gi te tut e aina daraona film banai oi ae.” (You made me cry, son. I came to watch this because I had thought of Humsafar and that it would have some love and romance but this was scary!).
I hugged her and I said, “I’m sorry!” But I think how is that logical, how can you expect the same guy to make the same thing again and again but that’s how the world operates and that’s how it is.
We shall someday work together, all of us. We’re wiser, better people now, it should be interesting if we do. But it should not be with that pressure that hey beat Humsafar or make another Humsafar! I would really refrain from that.
from HUM TV – Watch Dramas Online https://ift.tt/2DrS9bt
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