One evening in 1975, a couple exited Regal Cinema looking highly embarrassed by their teen daughter’s loud, intrusive sobs. The culprit was Oscarwinning Hollywood film ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’, which had such a profound effect on young Meher Tatna that she wept through most of it and then some. These days, though, as the Los Angelesbased president of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA)—a non-profit organisation of journalists that oversees The Golden Globe Awards—Tatna’s tear ducts are activated by things like lastminute venue changes. “It’s like throwing a hundred weddings,” says Tatna about the frenetic, often “political”, job of inviting 1200 guests to the ceremony that is the champagnesoacked, tipsy cousin of the Oscars.
Having wrapped up the 76th edition of the Globes in January, Tatna is in the city on her annual visit to her South Mumbai home. Earlier this week, after her return flight was cancelled due to airspace closures following the aerial encounter between the Indian Air Force and Pakistani fighter jets over the LOC, Tatna found, on her hands, time—a rare luxury in her breathless life as film reviewer for Singapore’s The New Paper andHFPA’s president. “I don’t sleep much,” says Tatna, who has “lost” her personal life to the dual roles. “I hope my friends come back.”
Most of her friendships from Mumbai’s J B Petit High School for Girls, are intact. Growing up near Metro Cinema, Tatna not only devoured several matinee shows including Marlon Brando’s ‘Julius Caeser’ all by herself but also cut classes—as an economics student at St Xavier’s College—to catch movies whose names escape her now. “I wanted to be an actress,” says Tatna, who later joined LA’s Brandeis University and did her best to hand out resumes but found work only sporadically. “Those days you didn’t see many people on screen who looked like me,” says Tatna who waited tables to get by. “I was the worst waitress in the world,” confesses Tatna, who hadn’t yet learnt the art of sweet-talking customers into giving her a better tip. That’s when she decided to write about Hollywood as a way of staying in the business.
From an entertainment reporter who would cover The Golden Globes by watching it on live TV in the press room to consuming its flesh-andblood form seated at The Beverly Hilton ballroom as HFPA’s chief, Tatna’s life has changed enough for her to appreciate the art of sweet-talking.
Last year, she made the headlines when she walked the Globes’ red carpet clad in red when the entire fraternity wore black in solidarity with #TimesUp, the Hollywood women’s initiative to fight sexual harassment. Tatna—who later clarified that she wore red because in Indian culture, “when you have a celebration, you don’t wear black”—has seen Hollywood growing vigilant and hiring more women post #TimesUp. She hopes #MeToo has a similar effect here. “This has been such a maledominated culture since times immemorial. It doesn’t believe women when they speak up,” says Tatna. “It’s important that those who abuse their power are shown up for it.”
Beyond overseeing the fun and frivolous awards though, the HFPA has a little-known charitable side. It provides grants to charities and its beneficiaries have included The Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation. Among the causes it supports is film preservation and restoration—something that Tatna knows is tripping over the same roadblocks here as elsewhere. “The establishment isn’t interested in preservation,” says Tatna, who wishes the film community would chip in.
No wonder the news of Mumbai’s sparkling new national film museum lights up Tatna. “Where is it?” she asks. Suddenly, it seems apt that Tatna—who has been the voice of a few characters on the Simpsons—-recently gave the voiceover for a videogame character called Dr Amari. Dr Amari is a medical professional who works in a place called Memory Den and helps people relive their past.
LADY IN RED: Meher Tatna is the president of Hollywood Foreign Press Association which oversees Golden Globes
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