School of Lies co-creator Ishani Banerjee decodes show, its ‘spiritual end’ and why she wanted to leave viewers with ‘uncomfortable feeling’

In an interview with indianexpress.com, Ishani, best known for writing Hansal Mehta’s Aligarh and Shefali Shah-Kirti Kulhari fronted Human, opens up about the process for School of Lies–penned by her, Nishant Agarwala and Shoaib Nazeer–how its authentic world was created, its “spiritual end” and why she wanted the viewers to be left with an “uncomfortable” feeling after the show.

Edited excerpts:

How are you processing the response?

It has been surprising, it’s a small show which is basically headlined by kids and is in English. Because it was set in an elite boarding school, it was a conscious call for us to keep a lot of English in the show. The world looked very unreal when we tried to do it in Hindi because as a practice in most boarding schools most people converse in English. So we knew this would be a challenge and yet the show has reached out to so many people, I have messages coming in from people, who are opening up about their childhood traumas after watching it and feeling it was captured authentically.

How did the show originate?

My first meeting with Avinash ended up being a long one! We both had seen each other’s work and were trying to make a film on a subject he had. During this time, the pandemic was on, and he happened to read a bunch of articles on boarding school stories and sent it to me. He told me he is thinking to do something in this space. I had some idea about what I wanted to do in that space due to a personal incident that had happened to me. I read those articles and told him that let’s do this story from a different kind of perspective and not do a straight, simple boy goes missing story. I wanted to examine what happens to young boys when they go through something and wanted to make a story from the perpetrators point of view. That was the starting point.

Ishani Banerjee on the location of School of Lies. (Photo: PR handout)

What was the research like? Because the boarding school world felt authentic and lived in.

Our entire researched happened during the lockdown, which was a blessing because a lot of boarding school students were home and were able to talk freely. We spoke to current students who were in boarding, from seventh standard to class 12th, students who had passed out, some even 20 years ago. So definitely around 100 people. The other writer, Nishant Agarwala, was from a boarding school, so he also had a network that we had access to. We also spoke to girl boarders even though our show wasn’t about that! We also went to a bunch of boarding schools in North and South and covered quite a bit of India.

What was the challenge to write School of Lies? Do you remember the number of drafts you wrote?

I don’t even remember! When you are writing a story that does not follow a formulaic pattern, where everything becomes alright in the end. It doesn’t leave you with a comforting feeling, it is actually quite the opposite. The idea of the show was to always leave the viewers with an uncomfortable feeling. When Avinash and I conceived it, that’s the feeling we were left with. Feeling of discomfort, this gut-wrenching feeling when we were thinking about these people. I was very sure that I wanted to write a show where that feeling was permeating through the storytelling.

So the biggest challenge was to write a story like this and convince people to make it, because today in OTT only a certain kind of content is constantly working. More and more production houses and platforms want to gravitate towards that kind of storytelling, but we were lucky we had BBC and Hotstar, who were completely on-board with it and felt it needed to be out there. The challenge still exists, I know audiences are loving it but there is also a section who is getting uncomfortable, who perhaps would be resisting to watch such kind of content, who would want a simple whodunnit mystery and not this kind of a slow burn, layered narrative.

Writer Ishani Banerjee with co-creator and director Avinash Arun. (Photo: PR Handout)

Also, Avinash has such an amazing hold on storytelling. It was amazing to see a director, who is not essentially writing the series, being with us throughout the process. He was involved in the storytelling and also involved me in the making of the show, that’s the kind of trust he had. That trust brings out the best in writing and making. I was part of the making, so it wasn’t that the writer is eliminated. It was beautiful.

Which character did you enjoy writing the most?

One of the most complex characters I have ever written is Sam Singh’s. The show was called something else previously and even at that time it was very clear in my head that it is not just about the young boarders but also about somebody who is a part of that world. Sam Singh is past, present and future. It is his story we are still in, he is also trying to get out of it. There is a hope that he wants to build for himself. I absolutely enjoyed writing it.

Amir Bashir is exceptional, the life that he gave the character was phenomenal. The moment he was in front of the camera, first time on sets, he gave two lines from a scene. I was on the monitor and then Avinash and I went to the side and hugged each other! We said, ‘Oh my God, this is it, we have got it!’ I am just so happy that he has not done anything like this on the OTT space. In fact, we got really lucky with the cast because every actor was top notch. From the kids and the 17 year olds who brought in such emotional maturity to the show to Nimrat, Geetika, Amir and others, who gave such a layered performance.

Can you talk to us about the end? Did you have multiple versions written for it and what do you make of it?

I always knew that I wanted a spiritual ending, where the character is left where he or she is but at the same time, I didn’t want a neat ending. I’d watch all these Western shows and realise how beautiful their endings would be, so real and powerful, where you are not going for the cliched everything-is-ok. It is for you to read what happens to those on the show–spoiler alert–especially Chanchal, even I am curious to know what happens to him when he grows up. It can go anywhere. The ending doesn’t need to be defined as ‘happy’ or ‘sad’, but these are a bunch of characters who we know what they have gone through. The last shot is so poetic, the way Avinash has shot it is stunning. Everything fell in place beautifully.

How do you look at your journey from Aligarh to School of Lies?

With School of Lies, I stepped up from being a writer to a co-creator and creative director, which has added more responsibilities! When I look back, I think the journey has been rewarding. I was in Mumbai and trying to do screenwriting at a time when storytelling was changing. Something like Aligarh got made with Manoj Bajpayee headlining it! I was 25, I thought everything is possible. Of course, as I later realsied, it isn’t easy at all. But it was a grind. I thought it is such a simple process, all you have to do is write, someone will make it and people will love it– but it is easier said than done! But I feel grateful for having worked with brilliant minds like Hansal Mehta, Kanu Behl (her upcoming film Despatch, also starring Manoj Bajpayee) and Avinash. The faith in me put by these makers feels overwhelming, but I am loving it.