Director Anushree Mehta always knew she wanted to celebrate her mother through her debut feature. She has traversed the road frequented by writers and directors without a ‘connection’ in the Hindi film industry, the milestones of which include writing for crime shows like CID and Savdhaan India and making a short (Unkahee, 2020).
She is wearing the director’s hat for the first time for a feature film, Mrs Undercover, a quirky tale of a homemaker/ mother who is actually a secret agent.
“Before making my first film, I knew I had to celebrate my mother through it and show how she dedicated her life to take care of our house as a homemaker. I wanted my film to have a social message but not be preachy. The entertainment factor was extremely important. I love the spy-comedy genre so I thought why not have it in an Indian context,” she says.
Over the years, Hollywood has peppered humour over the thrill of a spy movie, (Johnny English, Get Smart) but still there has been a dearth of female protagonists in such films.
“In Hindi Cinema this genre isn’t explored much but even in the West, there are not many spy comedies with female leads. Only Miss Congeniality and Spy come to mind. With Mrs Undercover, I wanted to amalgamate the close-knit family setup of Indian society with the high stakes of a spy film,” says Anushree.
The director shares that she always had Radhika Apte in mind while writing the script. “I had seen her work. As an actor, she is like a chameleon and she made the character very real. I remember narrating the script to her and five minutes into it she told me she is on board,” she says.
When it comes to casting, Anushree made a peculiar choice of using Sumeet Vyas in a negative role. Sumeet is the quintessential nice guy, at least on OTT with TVF series like Permanent Roommates and Tripling. In Mrs Undercover, however, he plays a serial killer who targets “strong and independent women.”
“Because of his previous roles, Sumeet has been compartmentalized as the ‘nice guy’. His character is called ‘The Common Man’ and this imagery of him as a nice man came in handy for the role. Misogyny is ingrained in people, you never know if the cordial man sitting next to you in a café is a sexist serial killer,” she says.
Anushree herself faced certain judgment in the industry. “After all I am a female director,” she says. “There were people who were not sure if I could handle a set on my own. They didn’t say it to my face but it hurt their ego that a woman is instructing them. But it was my job. A director has no gender.”
Mrs Undercover is produced by Abir Sengupta and Anushree. Also starring Rajesh Sharma and Saheb Chatterjee, the film premieres on ZEE5 on April 14.