Ep 444: Suman Kumar is Perennially Pregnant With Stories

He is best known for writing The Family Man and Farzi, but his journey to being a storyteller was far from smooth. Suman Kumar joins Amit Varma in episode 444 of The Seen and the Unseen to discuss the highs and lows of his life, as well as the craft of writing, directing and telling stories. (FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.) Also check out: 1. Suman Kumar on IMDb, Instagram, LinkedIn and his own website. 2. The Family Man -- Season 1 :: Season 2 :: Season 3. 3. Guns and Gulaabs -- Season 1. 4. Farzi -- Season 1. 5. Raghu Thatha -- written and directed by Suman Kumar. 6. Ranga Half-Pants -- Suman Kumar. 7. Scientific Advertising -- Claude Hopkins. 8. The Ghost and the Darkness -- Stephen Hopkins. 9. You've Got Mail -- Nora Ephron. 10. Angrezi Medium -- Homi Adajania. (CHECK) 11. The return of small-town creators on Instagram -- Shephali Bhatt. 12. lifeofpuja on Instagram. 13. Gangs of Wasseypur -- Anurag Kashyap. 14. On Writing -- Stephen King. 15. The Refreshing Audacity of Vinay Singhal — Episode 291 of The Seen and the Unseen. 16. Stage.in. 17. Gopallapurathu Makkal -- K Rajanarayanan (Ki Ra). 18. Madhu Babu and his audiobooks on YouTube. 19. Yandamuri Veerendranath on Amazon and YouTube. 20. Yerramsetty Sai. 21. Ilaiyaraaja on Spotify and YouTube. 22. The Blaft Anthology of Tamil Pulp Fiction -- Pritham Chakrabathy and Rakesh Khanna. 23. Advanced History of India -- KA Nilakanta Sastri and G Srinivasachari. 24. Sowmya Dhanaraj Is Making a Difference — Episode 380 of The Seen and the Unseen. 25. Pehla Nasha and More Than Words. 26. The Design of Everyday Things -- Don Norman. 27. Phantoms in the Brain -- VS Ramachandran. 28. The Reith Lectures -- VS Ramachandran. 29. Bobby McFerrin Demonstrates the Power of the Pentatonic Scale. 30. Aranyer Din Ratri — Satyajit Ray. 31. Days & Night In The Forest -- Sunil Gangopadhyay. 32. Train Dreams (the book) -- Denis Johnson. 33. Train Dreams (the film) -- Clint Bentley. 34. As Good as It Gets -- James L Brooks. 35. Crime and Punishment -- Fyodor Dostoyevsky. 36. The Vigil Idiot. 37. The Dream Is No More a Dream -- Suman Kumar. 38. Notting Hill -- Roger Michell. 39. All the President's Men -- Alan J Pakula. 40. Hrishikesh Mukherjee on Wikipedia and IMDb. 41. Adolescence — Created by Stephen Graham & Jack Thorne. 42. Oppenheimer -- Christopher Nolan. 43. Tumbbad -- Rahi Anil Barve. 44. Mayasabha -- Rahi Anil Barve. 45. On Film-Making --  Alexander Mackendrick. 46. Maheshinte Prathikaaram -- Dileesh Pothan. 47. Trance -- Anwar Rasheed, 48. Manjummel Boys -- Chidambaram S Poduval. 49. Romancham -- Jithu Madhavan. 50. Jaya Jaya Jaya Jaya Hey -- Vipin Das. 51. Su From So -- JP Thuminad. 52. No Country for Old Men -- The Coen Brothers. 53. The Shawshank Redemption -- Frank Darabont. 54. The Devil's Own -- Alan J Pakula. This episode is sponsored by The Six Percent Club. Join them to go from content idea to launch in just 45 days! Amit Varma runs a course called Life Lessons, which aims to be a launchpad towards learning essential life skills all of you need. For more details, and to sign up, click here. And have you read Amit's newsletter? Subscribe right away to The India Uncut Newsletter! It's free! Also check out Amit's online course, The Art of Clear Writing. Episode art: 'Story' by Simahina.