Surfing the waves of her passion
FOR former KZN actress Carishma Basday, playing the part of a young woman from a traditional Indian home who wants to break out and live her own dream, hit home in more ways than one.
Basday (Material, 31 Million Reasons and Mela) stars as Sunitha Patel in the film, Deep End, written and directed by Eubulus Timothy and filmed in Durban. An exclusive preview for POST readers will be held at Ster-Kinekor Gateway on Wednesday, March 13 at 8pm (see advert below).
Sunitha is a modern, accomplished young woman and is considered to be “highly eligible” and ready for an arranged relationship through her father. But she dreams of exploring and expanding on her natural flair for surfing – a no-no in her father’s books. Add to that an outside romantic interest and some race tension on the surfing front, and Sunitha finds herself juggling quite a bit in this coming of age story.
“I related to so much of Suni’s experiences but, actually, the part with her father was the hardest for me to relate to because my dad and I have the most incredible relationship.
“But having said that, I still come from a very typical Indian family. For example, it was like ‘you’re going to go off and become this actress, how are you going to feed yourself ?’, so I had faced those kind of challenges. Maybe not so much directly from my own dad, but definitely from family,” Basday explained.
“But I’ve always been like Suni. I’ve always been the dreamer. I’ve always been the one wanting to push the boundaries.”
In terms of the interracial relationships, it was like deja vu in some way. “I married a white, French man!” she laughed. “So it was hilarious, especially the scenes where Cory (Sunitha’s white American love interest in the film) is meeting her family. It was so reminiscent of what my own husband (Gael Le Martin) had to go through,” chuckled Basday.
Commenting on working on Deep End, Basday said it was an exceptionally challenging and rewarding experience – particularly as they had no control over the elements which would often affect the surf and planned shoots.
“Eubulus wouldn’t just sit on the beach and shout directions. He would wade in the water, as far as he could go, to tell me something and that kind of support made a world of difference.”
Basday said a highlight was really getting into the skin of her character by actually learning to surf and performing most of the surfing herself.
“We did have a stunt double for some of the bigger waves out there. It was really important to me that I learnt to surf. Thank goodness my husband is an excellent surfer. He taught me.”
Her hope for Deep End is a simple one. “My hope is that young women of all ages, races and cultures leave this movie feeling inspired.”
Deep End hits the cinemas on March 15.