' THE ICON" a Novel for Bollywood our maiden Fiction in Print! (VOL 33 Down Memory Lane )
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| SV Nathan Co Author |
We were bloggers in the Sulekha platform long back, which
no longer exist, and the bloggers have all migrated to Facebook, but we continue
our past friendship. We both had common interest with blogs on old Bollywood
movies and music. As we moved on to the new platform not a perfect one for blogging,
we thought with our passion of films why not try a full movie script together?
I was in California during that time and Nathan was in Saudi
Arabia the country with restrictions on social media. That was the time when IT
sector was blooming in India. The inspiration of our story came from the life
of Narayana Murthy and Sudha Murthy and the success of Infosys. We read
anecdotes of their initial days of struggle and their simple lifestyle after
becoming famous. There was this compelling one of Murthy’s changes in mindset
from being a communist to capitalist. The initial chapters were inspired from Narayana
Murthy’s life. The movie script must have twist and conflicts and cannot be straight
honest biography for which we had to have consent. As the story unfolded, we changed
it to a story of 3 generations.
Our Hero the Infotech Baron is a visionary, a loving husband,
and a caring father. All set for greater glory in his pursuit for excellence until
his nemesis arrives in the form of his own son. The prince the heir to be who
takes for granted his right to the father’s IT Empire. The prince walks out grabbing
his pound of flesh straight into the life of a Bollywood star. When IT merges
with Bollywood it is fireworks and, in the conflict, the Gyani emerges. This is
the crux of the story!
The whole communication between us was through emails only
and we never talked to each other as Nathan was in Saudi where voice
communication is hard, and internet is banned. This was not the handicap as
both had perfect understanding and respected each other’s views. This went on
for a couple of months with our thought process into this family drama at our own
leisurely pace.
We started writing scene by scene like a screenplay with
flash back like in movies and it took about six months to complete the fully
bound script of about 200 pages and this screenplay can be used as it is by any
director. It had all ingredients a contemporary story, punch dialogues,
characters with shades of gray and some touching moments which will make an
impact on the movie viewers. Nathan is great fan of Salim Javed, and we
pursued that route of entertainment.
The whole story revolves around Karnataka where I lived in
Mysore before for about 5 years when working for L&T. It was nostalgia for me to bring out the beauty
of this state which we always cherish from evergreen memories.
The childhood years of our hero is at Mysore in a lower middle-class
background with his father a government employee with meagre earnings. He could
not study in IIT although getting admission as his father could not afford and does
not care for his son’s future like his mother. He studies Engineering in JCE
Mysore with his dreams still intact. Later he joins IIT Madras for Masters.
Gopal meets Radha at IITM (Gopal and Radha are RK’s favorite
screen names!) and later establishes a successful IT Company Info-Times and they
live in an apartment at Jayanagar Bangalore, and the story starts from here and
the earlier parts shown in brief flashbacks. There are some catalysts for his
success like this character Kini (real Nilekani) and their family bondage
beyond work. The story of NM ends here and from here it takes a cinematic
route.
Here are the main characters.
Gopal the capitalist a man of principle who believes in
empowering people and leading a simple life after owning big IT Company Info-Times.
Radha his wife responsible for early success and who sacrifices
her professional career for bringing up the family. Gopal believes in only one
in the company as Director and Radha opts out.
Dr Kini The technocrat associated with Info-Times from the start-up
a hard-working technical wizard responsible for the success of the enterprise and
his wife Ragini.
Shivanna father of Gopal who has an acid tongue and who
thinks all is wrong with Gopal not enjoying his position and wealth a jogger who
thinks like a teenager.
Anirudh the foreign returned son of Gopal who wants to take over
the company from Gopal with support from Shivanna but ends up as management
trainee which makes him leave home.
Shubha daughter of Gopal who is a journalist for movie talk-show
and who wants to be on her own and does not want to be associated with her
father’s company.
Maya Mirchandani the Bollywood upcoming actress from Mumbhai
who is good at heart but not very ‘goody-goody’, but bitter about her past and
rebellious and ambitious by nature.
Krishna Karnad childhood friend of Gopal who runs a grocery at
Mysore and who is a typical rural Kannadiga a stanch devotee with simple and
contended life who is frustrated with corrupt politicians and the country
status.
Ajay son of Krishna who is a NSG Commando with whom Shubha
falls in love.
Chaudhry a politician and who breaks all rules to get things
done.
The story is woven around these characters and with glimpses
of hap hazard way Bollywood directors work .
We tried few different things in the script.
Our heroine Maya always has a spontaneous song on her lips based
on that moment which are old Bollywood classics of the golden era of 50s to 70s.
The whole script is embedded with famous songs like a musical as we both are lovers
of music. We chose about 40 classics blending with the situation.
We thought of this musical concept in 2014 when we wrote
this script. However, this concept of heroine singing (being a fan of S Janaki and
Ilayaraja singing hits of 70s and 80s Raja’ hits) was later than done in
a Tamil movie 96 released in 2018 which became a blockbuster of that year!
Another unique
attempt if one notices was that all the major twists in the story all happens
during the festival times and Holidays in
that year as the entire story unfolds
during that one-year period.
We visualized like the movie and went scene by scene some
flash backs, flash forward like you see in the movies. There were close to
around 100 scenes when we completed the complete script. What to do next?
Neither of us had any contact with the film industry. How to
reach out to the directors? If we email them what will happen if they copy and
claim that it is their own script? How do we ensure copyright protection?
We then thought of converting the script to the novel so
that we can get copyright protection and will be free to reach the Bollywood directors
for which this was written. It does not happen that way. Movie scripts are made
from novels. Being the engineers with reverse engineering mindset we went
unconventional way maybe wrong looking back now.
We wanted a renowned publisher who can edit for the novel
and market it. We reached out to a famous publisher then Cinnamon Teal
from Goa. They agreed to convert it to the novel and promised that they will
market it and will launch it across cities so that we can invite the film
directors to the launch event and that way and reach our
goal. They charged 50K for editing and sales promotion which we paid.
The publisher mainly did grammar check and pointed few minor
discrepancies in the script. The scenes were converted to chapters. We changed
our original title “Gyani “in the movie script to the novel “THE
ICON”.
The editing was complete, and we had to decide on the cover
page. My daughter Swetha is an artist and I wanted to use her artwork which she
has created before for the front page after getting her consent. The artwork perfectly
matched our heroine Maya’s character and in the back page of Gopal as Gyani
another artwork of hers.
Just when the editing was almost completed, and we were
getting ready for the launch of the book by the publishing house and planning
our visit to India came a letter from the editor. They cannot publish the book unless
we remove some contents. The thing they wanted us to remove was what were
passionate about close to our heart. We refused and it was a stalemate for few
months. What was that they wanted to remove and how did we solved that issue
and got published will be in the final concluding part. Also did we achieve our
goal after publishing or is it still a dream?
TO BE CONCLUDED
Buy The Icon Book Online at Low Prices in India | The Icon Reviews & Ratings - Amazon.in
Great ‘flashback’ of our own ‘story’ as story-tellers! Though it had’nt exactly hit the Bollywood Bull’s Eye as we had dreamt, looking back it had been a fantastic roller-coasting ride throwing our ideas mutually back and forth. It had been an exciting journey with occasional frustrating moments of ‘writer’s blocks’! But now when we look at the finished product, it seems incredible that both of us being professional engineers and total novices in writing, publishing etc have managed to put together a decent and engrossing (as vouched by few friends who had read it) novel. When I pick our book occasionally from the shelf to dust-off, I do feel a sense of satisfaction and pride for our ‘novel’ attempt! Whether the Bollywood Badshahs take notice or not, we do deserve a pat on our own backs and each others too! Thanks Sivaram for your company, though virtual so far. Though we have never met in person , ‘The Icon’ has brought the two of us close enough to sustain our long-term friendship. Let’s not stop dreaming and wish more success for ‘The Icon’ that we had created together!
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