, 2016
Early career In 1959, he started working as a
copywriter at a Mumbai-based
advertising agency, Lintas Advertising, where he steadily rose to become the creative head. Meanwhile, Benegal made his first documentary in
Gujarati,
Gher Betha Ganga (Ganges at the Doorstep) in 1962. He worked on the script for another decade before producing his first feature film. In 1963 he had a brief stint with another advertising agency called ASP (Advertising, Sales and Promotion). During his advertising years, he directed over 900 sponsored documentaries and advertising films. Between 1966 and 1973, Shyam taught at the
Film and Television Institute of India (FTII),
Pune, and twice served as the institute's chairman: 1980–83 and 1989–92. By this time he had already started making documentaries. One of his early documentaries
A Child of the Streets (1967), garnered him wide acclaim. In all, he has made over 70 documentary and short films. He was awarded the
Homi J. Bhabha Fellowship (1970–72) which allowed him to work at the
Children's Television Workshop,
New York, and later at Boston's
WGBH-TV.
Feature films After returning to Mumbai, he received independent financing and
Ankur (
The Seedling) was finally made in 1973. It was a realistic drama of economic and sexual exploitation in his home state,
Telangana, and Benegal became famous for it. The film introduced actors
Shabana Azmi and
Anant Nag and Benegal won the 1975
National Film Award for Second Best Feature Film. Shabana won the
National Film Award for Best Actress. The success that
New India Cinema enjoyed in the 1970s and early 1980s could largely be attributed to Shyam Benegal's quartet:
Ankur (1973),
Nishant (1975),
Manthan (1976) and
Bhumika (1977). Benegal used a variety of new actors, mainly from the FTII and
NSD, such as
Naseeruddin Shah,
Om Puri,
Smita Patil, Shabana Azmi,
Kulbhushan Kharbanda and
Amrish Puri. In Benegal produced
Nishant (''Night's End
) in 1975, and Manthan
(The Churning'') in 1976. For the first time, over five lakh (half a million) rural farmers in Gujarat contributed 2 each and thus became the film's producers. Upon its release, truckloads of farmers came to see "their" film, making it a success at the box office. After this trilogy on rural oppression, Benegal made a biopic
Bhumika (
The Role) (1977), broadly based on the life of well-known
Marathi stage and film actress of the 1940s,
Hansa Wadkar (played by
Smita Patil), who led a flamboyant and unconventional life. In the early 1970s, Shyam made 21 film modules for
Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE), sponsored by
UNICEF. This allowed him to interact with children of SITE and many folk artists. Eventually many of these children starred in his feature length rendition of the classic folk tale
Charandas Chor (
Charandas the Thief) in 1975. He made it for the
Children's Film Society, India. To quote film critic Derek Malcolm:
The 1980s Unlike most
New Cinema filmmakers, Benegal had private backers for many of his films and institutional backing for a few, including
Manthan (
Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation) and
Susman (1987) (Handloom Co-operatives). However, his films did not have proper releases. He turned to TV where he directed serials such as
Yatra (1986), for the Indian Railways, and one of the biggest projects undertaken on Indian television, the 53-episode television serial
Bharat Ek Khoj (1988) based on
Jawaharlal Nehru's book,
Discovery of India. This allowed him to survive the collapse of the New Cinema movement in the late 1980s due to paucity of funding, which led to many neo-realist filmmakers leaving. Benegal continued making films throughout the next two decades. He also served as the Director of the
National Film Development Corporation (NFDC) from 1980 to 1986. Benegal's next film
Mandi (1983), was a satirical comedy about politics and prostitution, starring Shabana Azmi and Smita Patil. Later, working from his own story, based on the last days of
Portuguese in Goa, in the early 1960s, Shyam released
Trikal (1985). Soon, Shyam Benegal stepped beyond traditional narrative films and took to biographical material to achieve greater freedom of expression. His first venture in this genre was with a documentary film based on
Satyajit Ray's life,
Satyajit Ray, in 1985. This was followed by works such as
Sardari Begum (1996) and
Zubeidaa, which was written by filmmaker and critic
Khalid Mohamed. In 1985 he was a member of the jury at the
14th Moscow International Film Festival.
The 1990s and beyond The 1990s saw Shyam Benegal making a trilogy on Indian Muslim women, starting with
Mammo (1994),
Sardari Begum (1996) and
Zubeidaa (2001). With
Zubeidaa, he entered mainstream
Bollywood, as it starred top Bollywood star
Karishma Kapoor and boasted music by
A. R. Rahman. In 1992, he made
Suraj Ka Satvan Ghoda (
Seventh Horse of the Sun), based on a novel by
Dharmavir Bharati, which won the 1993
National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Hindi. In 1996 he made another film based on the book
The Making of the Mahatma, based on Fatima Meer's,
The Apprenticeship of a Mahatma. This turn to biographical material resulted in
Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose: The Forgotten Hero, his 2005 English language film. He criticised the Indian caste system in
Samar (1999), which went on to win the
National Film Award for Best Feature Film. Benegal served as a president of the president of the
Federation of Film Societies of India. He was the owner of a production company called Sahyadri Films. He was the author of three books based on his own films:
The Churning with
Vijay Tendulkar (1984), which was based on
Manthan;
Satyajit Ray (1988), based on his biographical cinema,
Satyajit Ray; and
The Marketplace (1989), based on
Mandi. In 2009 he was a member of the jury at the
31st Moscow International Film Festival.
Later projects In 2008, his film
Welcome to Sajjanpur, starring
Shreyas Talpade and
Amrita Rao, was released to a good response. Its music was composed by
Shantanu Moitra, and it was produced by Chetan Motiwalla. Shyam Benegal is slated to direct an epic musical,
Chamki Chameli, inspired by Georges Bizet's classic Spanish opera
Carmen. The story revolves around the eponymous Chamki, a beautiful gypsy girl with a fiery temper and is written by
Shama Zaidi. The music is by A. R. Rahman and lyrics are by
Javed Akhtar. In March 2010, Benegal released the political satire
Well Done Abba. One of Benegal's last projects was a film based on the life of
Noor Inayat Khan, daughter of
Inayat Khan and descendant of
Tipu Sultan, who served as a British spy during
World War II. Benegal made a comeback on the small screen with
Samvidhaan, a 10-part mini-series revolving around the making of the Indian Constitution, to be aired on
Rajya Sabha TV from 2 March 2014.
Government of Bangladesh has confirmed Benegal would direct the biopic of
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman named
Mujib: The Making of a Nation. The film was released in 2023. ==Personal life and death==