Loveleen Tandan




Loveleen Tandan (Hindi: लवलीन टंडन, Punjabi: ਲਵਲੀਨ ਟੰਡਨ) is an Indian film director and casting director. She is known as the "co-director: India" of the four time Golden Globe, seven time BAFTA Award and eight Academy Award winning (including best picture) Slumdog Millionaire (2008), for which she shared a New York Film Critics Online Award for Best Director with Danny Boyle. She was also a casting director for several other films, including the Golden Lion winning and Golden Globe nominated Monsoon Wedding (2001) and the BAFTA Award nominated Brick Lane (2007). She was also the casting consultant for the Gotham Award and Independent Spirit Award nominated film The Namesake (2007).

Early life and background

Loveleen Tandan was born and raised in New Delhi, India and is the eldest of three siblings. She did her schooling from Mater Dei School. Loveleen studied Sociology Honors at the Hindu College, Delhi University. She was active in college politics and was nominated the Finance Minister of the college. She pursued a Master's Degree in Mass Communication from MCRC, Jamia Millia Islamia University.

Career

Loveleen Tandan first worked with Deepa Mehta on Earth (1998),[1] and later worked with Mira Nair on three films: Monsoon Wedding (2001), Vanity Fair (2004) and The Namesake (2006). She was also the casting director (alongside Shaheen Baig) for Brick Lane (2007), directed by Sarah Gavron and adapted from Monica Ali's novel of the same name.
Tandan's most recent credit is Slumdog Millionaire (2008), where she initially began as one of the film's casting directors (with Gail Stevens co-ordinating casting globally from London) but was, during production on the film, given the credit of "co-director: India" by Danny Boyle in recognition of her significant contributions. Boyle explained his reasoning behind the credit by stating it was "because I had her there every day, and I kind of relied on her enormously to make sure I didn’t make any big mistakes, and obviously, translation for the kids. And translation of the text because obviously, if you translate a line of Simon’s literally into Hindi, a seven-year-old is just going to go… So, they had to be given a line that was the equivalent in Hindi."[Tandan herself has stated that she was given the co-director credit after she "suggested to Danny and Simon Beaufoy, the writer of Slumdog, that it was important to do some of it in Hindi to bring the film alive (20% of the film is in Hindi). They asked me to pen the Hindi dialogues which I, of course, instantly agreed to do. And as we drew closer to the shoot date, Danny asked me to step in as the co-director."
The film has so far won eight academy awards, five Critics' Choice Awards, four Golden Globes and seven BAFTA Awards. Tandan's work as co-director of the film was recognized by the New York Film Critics Online Awards (NYFCCO Awards), which awarded "Best Director" to "Danny Boyle with Loveleen Tandan".
After the nominations for the 66th Golden Globe Awards were announced, a Chicago film critic launched an online campaign to ask why Tandan, who Boyle appointed as co-director for the film, was not nominated for Best Director alongside Boyle at the Golden Globes. The campaign organizer Jan Lisa Huttner stated: "If she's co-director during the filmmaking and marketing process, why isn't she co-nominee when the awards are passed out?" She noted "how rare it is for female directors to be in the awards race." After finding out about this campaign, Tandan sought to end it, stating, "I can't tell you how embarrassed I am by this [...] The suggestion is highly inappropriate, and I am writing to you to stress that I would not wish it to be considered.Slumdog Millionaire's producer Christian Colson says Tandan's credit is being misconstrued to mean she is on equal creative footing with Boyle. Colson stated that Tandan's title was "strange but deserved" and was developed over "a Coca Cola and a cup of tea" in order to identify her as "one of our key cultural bridges."
On May 15, 2010, Huttner received a "Silver Feather" award from the Illinois Woman's Press Association commending her for her work on the 2009 Oscar controversy.

Filmography

Director

Casting director

Casting consultant

Art department

  • Earth (Indian title: 1947) (1998) - production assistant

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