Mira Nair's Monsoon Wedding explores family bonds, tradition, and love.

Filmmaker Mira Nair has revealed that her son, Zohran Mamdani, now the mayor of New York City, was her first choice to play the lead role in her BBC adaptation of “A Suitable Boy” — a role that ultimately went to actor Ishaan Khatter.

In an industry often content to either idolise or invisibilise women, Nair managed to carve a cinematic language that neither glorifies nor redeems them. She allows them to take up space, to be complicated, to have appetites.

In a 2018 conversation with journalist Vir Sanghvi at the Jaipur Literature Festival, Nair shared how she was approached to direct “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”. At the time, however, she was grieving the sudden loss of her mother-in-law, Kulsoom Alibhai, whom she fondly called “Ammie”. The death occurred while Alibhai was visiting New York for medical treatment.

Ever the wonderful storyteller, Mira manages to tell such a heart-breaking story which would surely bring a tear to the eyes of dual citizenship holders.