Mira Nair’s Sweeping Period Drama ‘A Suitable Boy’ Arrives in North America Next Month
- Acorn TV premieres the BBC Studios’s screen adaptation of Vikram Seth’s classic, bestselling novel.
Oscar-nominated film director Mira Nair’s BBC TV series, “A Suitable Boy,” will make its highly-anticipated North America debut on Acorn TV in December. Recently the first series to close the prestigious Toronto International Film Festival, this sweeping period drama is directed by Nair and adapted by Andrew Davies from Vikram Seth’s bestselling novel of the same name. Seth is one of the series’ executive producers. The series premiered on BBC One on July 26, as one of its highest-rated launches this year.
With a stellar cast of some of India’s well-known actors like Tabu, Ishaan Khatter, Shahana Goswami and Ram Kapoor, the six-part, six-hour drama is an epic tale of life and love is set in vibrant 1950s India.
Tanya Maniktala makes her debut as 19-year-old literature student Lata Mehra, the series’ central character. She seems to have her life already mapped out, thanks to old traditions, and her meddling yet well-intentioned mother, Rupa (Mahira Kakkar), who wants to find her a suitable husband. Torn between family duty and the excitement of romance and inspired by rebellious Western writers and daring new ideas, Lata is determined to embark on her own journey of love and self-discovery as she decides her own future against the turbulent backdrop of post-Partition India. Over the course of the series, three very different men try to win Lata’s heart: the dashing, yet mysterious university student and star cricket player Kabir Durrani (Danesh Razvi), self-made shoe salesman Haresh Khanna (Namit Das) and lawyer-turned-writer Amit Chatterji (Mikhail Sen).
Connected to Lata through their siblings’ marriage, the charming and passionate but directionless Maan Kapoor (Khatter) is determined to enjoy life to the fullest. His behavior has been hugely disappointing for his father, the progressive Revenue Minister Mahesh Kapoor (Ram Kapoor), who can’t let anything unbalance his political career at a crucial moment. However, when Maan becomes infatuated with the glamorous yet much older singer and courtesan Saaeda Bai (Tabu), the consequences could be catastrophic. His best friend is lawyer Firoz Ali Khan (Shubham Saraf), son of the wealthy Nawab Sahib of Baktar.
“‘A Suitable Boy’ has been one of my favorite novels since the day it was written,” says Nair in a press release. “I read it repeatedly and felt as if it was my best friend. I felt a sense of great companionship and understanding and a sense of evoking a time in India in which I longed to have lived…It’s an extraordinary tale of love and friendship across class and certainly across religion. Vikram Seth is able to reach the depths of human relationships — the heart, the mind and love in all its peculiarities. It’s universal and affects and relates to everyone…[The series] gives me this vast canvas as I have 113 actors in the show and six hours to let the story unfold…It’s so full of surprises and rhythms, where things need their time and their pace.”
“A Suitable Boy” was produced by Lookout Point and is internationally distributed by BBC Studios. Music for the series is composed by BAFTA-winning composer Alex Heffes, with world renowned sitar player Anoushka Shankar (her first for a TV series). The original television soundtrack for A Suitable Boy — released by Silva Screen Records — is now streaming in the U.S. and Canada.
The series will premiere exclusively on Acorn TV in the U.S. and Canada with two episodes on Monday, Dec. 7 and weekly episodes every Monday through Jan. 4, 2021.
Acorn TV is North America’s most popular and largest streaming service focused on British and international television. Called “a glorious streaming service… an essential must-have” by The Hollywood Reporter, “Netflix for the Anglophile” by NPR and recommended for featuring “the most robust, reliable selection of European, British, Canadian and Australian shows” by The New York Times, AMC Networks’ Acorn TV has quickly become one of the leading streamers for a specialized audience and is commercial free. Acorn TV currently features the medical drama “The Good Karma Hospital” starring Amita Acharia, the highest-rated UK program of 2019, “Line of Duty,” Series 5 from Jed Mercurio (Bodyguard), the compelling documentary “Bollywood: The World’s Biggest Film Industry” and the movie “The Boy with the Topknot.” Acorn TV offers