Writer-Director Adam J. Graves ‘Anuja’ Interview

In Adam J. Graves and Suchitra Mattai’s Anuja, resilience in the face of hardship is the central heartbeat. The short film, doubling as both a heartwarming tribute to sisterhood and as a social awareness campaign about the effects of unchecked child labor, focuses on Anuja (Sajda Pathan), a young girl who lives with her older sister, Palak (Ananya Shanbhag), in Delhi, India as they live in poverty working long hours at a garment factory. One day, when a social worker (Gulshan Walia) arrives at the factory to expose the overseer for working Anuja illegally, he proposes that the youngster take part in an exam that will get her into a boarding school to better her chances of escaping her station. The two sisters are then tasked to raise money for the participation fee while Anuja decides the fate of her future. 

Fresh off of Academy Award voting precursor wins for best live-action short at the HollyShorts Film Festival in Los Angeles and the grand prize winner at the New York International Short Film Festival, the short film has also garnered support from Indian filmmakers Mindy Kaling and Guneet Monga Kapoor.

Below, Graves talks to Deadline about his inspirations, working with young actors and raising awareness about the plights of child labor.

DEADLINE: You have a varied background, from your PhD in philosophy to your various studies within South Asian culture and language. You also are a teacher. I’m curious how your expertise helped shape you as a filmmaker and come up with the origins of Anuja. 

ADAM J. GRAVES: I did my undergraduate degree in South Asian studies and wrote a master’s thesis on Abhinavagupta, the 12th-century Kashmir Shaivism philosopher who wrote in the domain of Indian Hindu philosophy known as Tantra. But it’s not [the same as the] new age Tantrism today. His work had very little to do with that. I spent about five or six years of my life going back and forth between India and I studied at Banaras Hindu University. I was always fascinated with Indian culture and literature, especially philosophy. And so, I knew that I wanted to film in India. It’s such a visually beautiful place. The energy and the culture are so rich.

My wife is of South Asian descent. She played a large role in shaping this project and inspiring it, quite frankly. Her family’s history is rather complicated. Her ancestors go back to a place called Gorakhpur in northern India. They were brought by the British to Guyana as indentured laborers after the British abolished slavery. They turned to indentured servitude, and because of that family history, we’ve always been interested and concerned with labor issues. So that was the origins of the project, just bringing these two things together, wanting to shoot in India, and also having a concern with labor issues. And we were coming out of the pandemic, and everybody was talking about supply chains. But they were talking about the consumer end of supply chains. And we’re like, “Well, what’s happening on the other end? Not just here, but what’s going on where in terms of the production?”

We came across a statistic that one in 10 kids, globally, is engaged in child labor, which was shocking to us because that seemed like an incredibly high number, 160 million kids. And we thought, “Well, how many films, really, can we think of off the top of our head that deal with those kids or with kids living in that context?” And we couldn’t think of that many. So, we thought this would be an interesting way to anchor the story. Let me just say that I feel that it’s an incredible privilege to be able to make film. And if you can, if you have the opportunity, then why not use the lens as a window that you can provide people into another world and provide people an experience that will allow them to empathize with people who don’t maybe have it as well off as some of us. Principally, I feel a film has to be a work of art that speaks to some of the universal aspects of human existence.

DEADLINE: While your short film does examine the life of child labor, it also has levity and this balance between resilience and joy amongst the struggle. Anuja has her sister and even strangers who care about her future and safety. Why was it important to add this layer to the film? 

GRAVES: Two things happened. One, while we were doing research for the film and we were meeting with the children who were either working or formally working, it was just so evident to us, early on, that we had to pay tribute to the joy that these kids were able to find in really difficult circumstances. The kind of energy, creativity, and resilience was palpable when we met with these kids, so we wanted to make sure that we built that into the film and become part of the story. It wasn’t just a doom and gloom story about kids who had it tough, but it was also a story that highlights the resilience and the spirit of these children. Secondly, we wanted to make sure the film was something these kids would enjoy. I mean, they kind of became the audience for us as we were kind of crafting this story. We wanted to make sure that it wasn’t just going to be a film. We knew that we were going to share it with them. And we want it to be a gift to them in some way, something that they would watch and enjoy. And that meant it had to be more than just a dark, dramatic portrait of life in a factory. 

DEADLINE: You worked with Salaam Baalak Trust, which is also where you ended up finding the lead actress. What was the collaboration process like? 

GRAVES: It developed organically while we were researching. We were working with a number of nonprofits actually in and around Delhi. And the Salaam Baalak Trust’s mission seemed to resonate with what we were trying to do with the film. I think that has to do with the fact that it’s a nonprofit founded by the director Mira Nair’s family. Mira Nair is a towering figure in global cinema. She’s of Indian origin, but she’s lived in Uganda, New York, and everywhere else. So, I don’t want to say she’s an Indian filmmaker because she’s a person of the world. But she made a movie, Salaam Bombay!, about street children in Bombay, in what is now Mumbai. And after her mother saw the film, she was inspired to start a nonprofit. So, with the help of Mira, they established this organization that provides a home and educational opportunities for street children.

Maybe I’m speculating, but I think because a film inspired this nonprofit, that organization recognized that art, especially performing arts, can be a really important vehicle for cultivating a kid’s sense of self-worth and confidence. So, they have a really robust theater program within this orphanage. So, when we were developing the film, they understood right away what we were trying to do. On the other hand, some of the other organizations thought we were trying to make a documentary about them. And because they have a theater program, they had a lot of kids who they wanted to submit. We felt early on that, “OK, we have to try. We know it’s going to be difficult, but we have to try to cast directly from the community.” Then the Salaam Baalak Trust was an organization that was open. Their kids were excited to be featured in a film.

 So, when we were casting, we looked at self-tapes from all over India, especially a lot from Mumbai and the film industry, kids who already had a film background. But we also received a lot from the Salaam Baalak Trust and from a couple of other nonprofits. They’re also located in the Paharganj, one of two neighborhoods that are up against each other in Old Delhi. I knew I wanted to film there, and one of the factories we filmed was just north of there. The movie theater we wanted to film in was north of there as well. They helped us with everything from locations to research. Ideally, we want to use the film as a tool to raise awareness about child labor, but also, hopefully, gets money for the Salaam Baalak Trust. They do great work. 

DEADLINE: Talk about casting Sajda Pathan and Ananya Shanbhag as sisters. They are so great onscreen. 

GRAVES: We were so lucky, Sajda. She lives at the Salaam Baalak Trust. But just not long before she was in the film, less than a year before, she was living on the streets with her older sister. She acted before she was cast in Anuja, so I can’t take credit for having discovered her or anything, but her own life experience parallels in really interesting ways that of the character of the film. And that’s pure accident. We didn’t write the script for her. But she was living without parental support on the streets and had an older sister. So, I think partly because she has an older sister, she could connect with Ananya. Ananya has a younger sibling, so when they met, they just immediately clicked. We didn’t do much in the way of rehearsals because, in my very limited experience working with child actors, sometimes the more you rehearse, the less life there is in the performance. And I think that can be true for children actors or adult actors. So, what we did is we tried to get them together. We all stayed in a hotel together, like a motel/hotel down in Paharganj and in close quarters.

Sajda was staying with a social worker, and Ananya had her father along on set. We spent every moment of the day together for about three days before we started shooting. We played games, we had ice cream, and we had fun. They enjoyed each other’s company, and just very quickly became super tight. And you could see that.

DEADLINE: Mindy Kaling and Guneet Monga Kapoor joined as producers on Anuja. That must have been very affirming. What do you think people are resonating with? 

GRAVES: These are two of my favorite people in the world, not just because they’re on board. We’ve specifically pursued them because [of what] we saw in them, their own causes, and the kinds of work they do. So, Guneet, for example, The Lunchbox is one of my favorite all-time films, an early feature film she’d worked on. And, of course, The Elephant Whisperers… she consistently makes incredible work. It meant a lot to us to have such a towering figure within Indian cinema endorse the film and come on board and get behind it. Mindy herself has done so much for raising awareness of and foregrounding stories of women and girls. She’s also a towering figure, not just in the entertainment arts industry world but also among the Indian diaspora community. And so having her vouch for the film and having it resonate with her so much is really important.

I think the thing that’s incredibly satisfying for every filmmaker who finds an audience is the sense that it somehow captures something universal, so you don’t have to come from this background to somehow be inspired by it or recognize yourself in it. We were trying to capture something about the universal features of childhood, and I think that’s one of the things that Mindy saw there, and that’s really heartwarming for us to have her on board. So, we’re super flattered, honored, and excited to see where it goes from here.

DEADLINE: You’re in the conversation for the Oscars. What’s going through your mind, and what would you like people to consider? 

GRAVES: The two leads of the film, Sajda and Ananya, are the heart and soul of this project. I think anybody who watches films knows. Our cinematographer, Akash Raje, is incredible. I’m proud of all aspects of the film. But the heart and soul are these two incredibly gifted young actresses who gave us everything they got. And I’m just so proud of the fact that their performances are finally getting an audience, and they’re being seen. And my dream—and this is the thing that I try not to fantasize too much about—is to bring Sajda to the Oscars.

 I’ll tell you a silly story. When I was flying over for production, I was in LAX. I wanted to bring something for Sajda, a gift for the two actresses. But I was sick right before the trip, so I didn’t have much chance to shop. So, when I got to the airport, I wanted to bring them something from America that would be more interesting to them instead of picking something up at the Indian airport. I went into the gift shop and found a hat and sweater for Ananya, but they didn’t have anything in Sajda’s size because she’s so small. So, I found this Oscar replica statue. Of course, she had no idea what it was at the time when I gave it to her, so we had to explain it to her. But before we shot the film, I have a photo of her with this plastic Oscar, and the fact that we are now in this position talking about the real Oscar is really surreal.

[This interview has been edited for length and clarity]