'Manorathangal' series | My father understood woman's psyche well: Aswathy Nair on MT

M T Vasudevan Nair's works, celebrated for their expressive and poetic style of narration, have stood the test of time. Recently nine of his short stories found visual expression through 'Manorathangal', a Zee 5 original conceived by his daughter Aswathy Nair. In a chat with Onmanorama, Aswathy, who is a dancer by profession, agreed that the selection process indeed had its set of challenges as they had to narrow down on nine of the literary luminary's best works.
“Definitely, the process was challenging given that my father has a collection of short stories that are loved by many. We decided to first narrow down the number to 50. After lot of deliberation, we then brought the number down to 20. Narrowing it down to another nine was an excruciating task. Our primary focus was to ensure that all the stories are unique in premise and that they should have nothing in common,” she said.

Aswathy added that she conceived the idea for an anthology of her father's works during Covid time when she watched 'Stories by Rabindranath Tagore' on Prime Video. “That was the first time I thought about a similar project based on my father's works. The journey began four years ago. My biggest responsibility was to ensure that my father's stories were told in the most beautiful manner visually,” said Aswathy.
She also directed one of the films 'Vilpana' in the anthology. Aswathy admits the film was supposed to be helmed by someone else initially. “Since the director who committed to the project could not go forward with the work, we initially thought of scrapping the film. However, the creative team of Saregama intervened and asked me to direct it,” she said.

Filmmaking was a new challenge for Aswathy. “Despite the challenge, I knew Vilpana very well and could really relate to the character Gita Parekh played by Madhoo. Gita is the character you see around you. In fact, we all can identify with the women in 'Manorathangal', their fears and conflicts. Their emotions are universal,” she said.
Aswathy feels that her father has managed to understand the woman's psyche well despite being a man. “Kuttyedathi is one of the finest examples. During those times, you could not imagine such a character, but my father brought those women to life. Though none of the women in his works are unconventional, they are all women with strong convictions,” she added.