The recent web series, Jubilee, about the early years of Hindi cinema, has suddenly created an interest in Devika Rani and Himansu Rai, founders of the legendary Bombay Talkies. The show had fictionalized versions of the two movie pioneers, but most informed critics pointed out the inspiration behind the characters.
A few years ago, documentary filmmaker Usha Deshpande visiting Manali tried to look for the place where Devika Rani had retired to, with her second husband, Svetoslav Roerich. To her surprise, nobody knew of Devika Rani, they knew vaguely of a Russian painter who lived there. She found that many people from the film industry did not know of her either, which led her to make a documentary, Discovering Devika, through which she tries to encapsulate the life and legacy of that remarkable woman.
It’s not the first attempt to give Devika Rani her due—Kishwar Desai’s book The Longest Kiss: The Life And Times Of Devika Rani was a well-researched biography; Desai also wrote a play on her, which Lillete Dubey directed.
Some film buffs may have seen her films like Karma and Achhut Kanya, but sadly, what pops in the mind when her name is mentioned, is that she had once eloped with actor Najam-ul-Hasan—an episode that is at the centre of Jubilee. It is as if her education, intelligence and talent did not matter, just that scandal was tagged to her forever.
Ushe Deshpande rightly says, “If it were a man, he would not have had to suffer like she did. Sasadhar Mukherjee, who was her biggest critic and eventually walked out of Bombay Talkies to form his own, Filmistan, had affairs with a few of his leading ladies, but no fingers were pointed at him.” Devika Rani was eventually persuaded to return, but her marriage to Rai never recovered from this blow, still they stayed together till Rai’s death in 1940 at the age of 48. It was rumoured then and was confirmed later by the mentions in her letters, that Rai, battling mental health issues himself was violent and abusive towards his wife.
Before Devika Rani Choudhary, with her privileged background entered the world of cinema, acting was considered a disreputable profession, particularly for women. Because she came from the upper class family of the first Indian Surgeon-General of Madras Col. M.N. Chowdhury, and was a grandniece Rabindranath Tagore, her choice of a film career, paved the way for other women from respected families to work in the movies.
She was sent to boarding school in England at age nine and grew up there. After completing her schooling, she joined the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) and the Royal Academy of music to study acting and music, at a time when aristocratic women did not enter showbiz. She also did for courses in textile and décor design.
In 1928, she met filmmaker and actor Himanshu Rai in London. He was so captivated by her beauty that he asked her to join his production company. Which is how, Devika Rani, assisted in costume design and art direction for Rai’s film A Throw of Dice. The two married in 1929, and went to Germany where she studied filmmaking in Berlin. It is well known that she underwent training at the UFA Studios in the art and technique of acting under Eric Pommer, and other aspects of film production including costume and set designing and make-up, under eminent directors like G.W. Pabst, Fritz Lang, Emil Jannings and Josef von Sternberg. She is also reported to have worked with Marlene Dietrich. With such impeccable crendentials, she could have achieved great heights, but showbusiness had not yet fully opened the doors of power to women.
Rai then cast himself as hero and her as heroine in his next production, the bilingual film Karma (1933) made simultaneously in English and Hindi. Karma was Devika Rani’s first film as an actor and Himanshu Rai’s last; it did well in the West, due to its exotic fairy-tale appeal, but flopped in India. After Karma, Rai concentrated on movie-making. (The Longest Kiss of Desai’s book refers to a record-setting four-minute lip lock in Karma).
In 1934, she and Rai co-founded the production company and studio, Bombay Talkies, which produced over a hundred films and launched dozens of careers, including those of Ashok Kumar, Leela Chitnis and Dilip Kumar, but also many writers, directors, composers. Bombay Talkies was the first cinema company to be listed on the stock exchange and was considered a world-class studio in line with international standards. German director Franz Osten, and the cameraman Carl Josef Wirsching worked at the studio. Devika Rani is quoted as having said, “The objective of the studio was, to put the [Indian] film industry at par with major industries of repute… to select a number of first-rate students from all over India…It was our aim to attract the best element in Indian society, with an educated and cultured background, to produce the highest type of art.” It is to the credit of the power couple that they achieved some of those goals.
When, in keeping up with their manifesto, a Bombay Talkies film, Jawani Ki Hawa, employed two Parsi women, the Homji sisters, renamed Saraswati Devi (composer) and Chandraprabha (actress), there was an uproar in the community, with angry letters being sent to the press.
After Himansu Rai’s death, the fiery Devika Rani took over the management of Bombay Talkies and produced several films. However, in a strictly patriarchal field, where women are still not at par with men, and so few are in positions of power, she had to fight, negotiate and maneuver her way to keep control of Bombay Talkies. It was not common for a woman in those days, to be handling finance and business; it is still difficult. Jubliee portrays Sumitra Kumari, the fictional Devika Rani, as scheming and manipulative, which may have been partially true, but it would take a woman to do whatever was needed to keep the wolves at bay.
In 1945, probably tired of all the wrangling at Bombay Talkies, she quit and married the Russian painter Svetoslav Roerich..She retired from the movies, though the couple led an active social life, setting up vast estates in Manali and Bengaluru. She was the first recipient of the Dadasaheb Phalke Award, when it was instituted in 1970. She died on March 9, 1994, at the age of 85.
Devika Rani was given labels like The First Lady of Indian Cinema and Dragon Lady, but hers was a life of courage and achievement, worthy of a tribute with a proper and respectful biopic.
(This piece first appeared in The Free Press Journal dated May 5, 2023)
