Exclusive | Arunima Sharma Eyes 2027 Release for Naseeruddin Shah Documentary: 'He Has a Complicated Relationship with Fame'

By the time filmmaker Arunima Sharma wraps production on her raw, intimate, and unfiltered documentary on legendary actor Naseeruddin Shah, she will be sitting on close to 30 hours of footage. Offering unprecedented access to the icon, the project — titled Backstage — is already 60 percent complete.

"His memoir, And Then One Day, only takes us up to the age of about 32. This film is him today at 75, and simultaneously also about him at various stages of his life," the National Award-winning filmmaker tells The Hollywood Reporter India.

Aiming to capture everything that makes Shah a pioneering legend—including his completely unguarded approach to discussing his own life—Sharma promises a comprehensive portrait. "The doc will also feature his hilarious stories from the sets of B-grade Hindi films of the 80s and 90s."

Sharma, who served as an associate director on films like Cocktail and Finding Fanny before helming popular Prime Video series like Jee Karda and Four More Shots Please!, talks about the creative process of mounting the independent documentary, which is currently eyeing a mid-2027 release.

What aspects of his life will the documentary chronicle?

It is an intimate portrait of Naseer, the person and the actor. When we were celebrating his 75^th birthday with his close friends and family and he was making a speech in his warm humorous style that I have known for years, I had this thought; there’s so much about him that people still don’t really know. Not just the actor everyone admires, but the person, the mind, the journey, the craft behind it all.

I felt there should be something people can return to even years from now, to truly understand him.

So I went to meet him soon after that and told him, ‘I want to make a film about you — something that people can see to get to know you, that’ll stay as memory…’ And in his trademark baritone, he said, ‘Toh banao.’

Just like that, he gave me his life rights. ‘To be loved is to be understood,' and through this film I want to understand him more deeply.

Theatre is what keeps him passionate and keeps him going. It’s his love. His work in theatre is an important part of my documentary, apart from his extraordinary body of work in cinema of course.

What specifically nudged you to make a documentary on him though?

Most of us know Naseer through his work, and through his public persona. In interviews, you often see the serious, articulate, opinionated side of him. People tend to either revere him or intellectualise him.

I want to make a film that just lets him be. I am there as a filmmaker to witness his life and observe him being him, and not try to dramatise or revere or manipulate anything. He himself has a complicated relationship with fame, he does not like being revered. Part of it is like shooting a wildlife documentary; when you are in the wild, you wait and you watch and let life unfold. If you are lucky, you’ll get to capture it.

Will the documentary focus on all of that?

I want to capture his humour... very few people know that he’s a very funny man. I want to capture his empathy, his vulnerabilities, his intensity, his guilt, his close relationships, and his past. His memoir And Then One Day only takes us up to the age of about 32. This film is about him today at the age of 75, and simultaneously also about him at various stages of his life.

I’m not interested in interviewing other people, colleagues, etc. It’s not that kind of format where 30 other people say good things about him. It’s an inside-out look rather than an outside-in one. The only other person who I really want to include thoughts from is Ratna (Pathak Shah, actor-wife).

And of course, for filmmakers, actors and film buffs, his life and way of working has valuable insights into the workings of an actor’s mind, craft, rigour. Not to forget, his hilarious stories from the sets of B-grade Hindi films of the 80s and 90s.

You’ve known him for over two decades. In what ways did that kind of access and genuine understanding of his life help in the making?

Familiarity, I would say, is a big factor that is shaping this film. It’s the lens through which I view him. Having been close friends for 20 years, our conversations are free-flowing. He does not hold back in general, but with me I’m lucky that he hardly holds back anything he wants to say or feels. And that honesty is disarming and precious.

Because of his trust, my cinematographer Aditya Varma and I have access to very intimate spaces in his life — whether it’s at home, backstage in theatre, on film sets, or inside his vanity van. Those are the moments where you really see someone with their guard down, and that’s what interests me the most.

Aditya is a very gifted cinematographer. He recently shot Not a Hero by Rima Das, which received a Crystal Bear Special Mention at the Berlinale. I love what his gaze brings to the film; it’s gentle, tactile, something you can touch and feel.. non-gimmicky and self-assured. For a docu filmmaker and DOP, your instinct, as we know, is one of the most important things to be tuned into and to follow.

I was 19 when I first met Naseer. I had gone to narrate a feature film script I’d written, which eventually became Foto, a children’s film that later won the National Award for Best Children’s Film. I was the writer and associate director on it... we shot it in beautiful Ranikhet.

Somehow, right from the beginning, Naseer and I clicked. He has always been no-nonsense, and so have I, especially in my work since I was very young. I was a bright, enthusiastic, hardworking kid who wasn’t scared to express her opinions even to a veteran. Then our friendship developed over time.

What’s the current status of the documentary?

We’ve completed about 60 percent of the shoot. From the beginning, the idea was to make the film slowly and organically — to spend a few days with Naseer every month over the course of a year, rather than shooting him intensively over a short period of time. We expect to wrap the shoot in another six months.

How many hours of footage do you have so far?

At this point, we already have close to 15 hours of footage, and we’ll probably shoot another 12 to 15 hours before the film is complete. What’s been interesting is that the film keeps evolving as we spend more time with him and continue observing different aspects of his life and work.

The documentary is currently funded by Sayan Banerjee, founder of Colour Palette Films. Even though it’s an independent production at the moment, we’re shooting in full broadcast-quality picture and sound because we want the film to have a lasting archival and cinematic value.

We haven’t partnered with a platform yet, but the plan is to complete the film by mid-2027 and release it the same year.

What has been the biggest challenge in mounting this?

The biggest challenge has definitely been funding and finding the right platform for the documentary. Perhaps, a part of that also comes from the fact that Naseer has been very vocal about his politics and his opinions. Personally, that’s actually one of the things I love about him; his fearlessness and honesty.

Also, my producer and I come from the world of commercial Hindi cinema and advertising, so we’re still relatively new to the ecosystem of documentary funding, international grants and foreign co-productions. It’s a very different space, with its own processes and networks.

But at the same time, I didn’t want to wait endlessly for funding before beginning the film. Last year, Naseer was doing some really interesting film work that he was excited about, and his theatre schedule was also packed. It felt important to capture that phase of his life as it was happening, rather than postponing the shoot and losing those moments.

So we decided to just go ahead and start filming. In many ways, that instinctive decision has shaped the spirit of the documentary itself — it has allowed the film to grow organically and truthfully alongside his life, instead of feeling overly planned or manufactured.