On Sunday, Riverdale was in Mumbai. The Netflix India office in the city’s plush business and residential district BKC was transformed into the bustling town that forms the location of Archie Comics. The streaming giant is, of course, attempting a Hindi film based on the much-loved teen comic — which has its fans among all ages — being directed by Zoya Akhtar.

On November 5, a select group of journalists from certain parts of the country were provided a sneak peek of the trailer of The Archies, a little more than a month ahead of the film’s release on December 7. Playing host at the screening, which was befittingly turned into an Archie Comics wonderland, were Zoya and co-writer Reema Kagti, who happen to be longtime collaborators, as well as Team Netflix. t2 chatted with Zoya and Reema post the screening about the world and vibe of The Archies.

The trailer of The Archies is rooted in the ’60s and yet seems so magical and almost otherworldly. Would you agree?

Zoya Akhtar: That’s what we went for. We definitely wanted the rooting of the ’60s, which in India, strangely, was the late ’50s, because global trends came to India later. It wasn’t like today where everything that is out globally is also in India at the same time. Our late 1950s was possibly 1964 in London....

One needs to keep in mind that we had gained independence less than two decades ago....

Zoya: Yes, that’s true. In The Archies, we definitely wanted a sense of rooting. But we also wanted that when it opens, the viewer should have a sense of opening a storybook and stepping into this otherworldliness that is slightly magical. That’s the comic, you know? That’s the magic of it.

What was the key to achieving that?

Zoya: A great crew. That’s the key! Hire very talented crew. Between Suzanne Merwanji, who is the production designer, Poornamitra Singh, who was the costume designer, Avan Contractor, who did the hair, Natasha (Nischol) did the make-up, Nikos Andritsakis shot the film, the cameraman, the music directors.... The key is just getting the right people that have an aesthetic together.

The Archies cast

That must have also come a lot from the writing, right?

Reema Kagti: The story sets the tone and then you reference it and say: ‘Okay, how far am I pushing it? How real are we going?’ If we go too real, do we take away the magic of it? If we go too much by the comic, then do we take away the rooting of it?’ You have to believe it and you have to find that fine balance. There is a timelessness to The Archies and an innocence which we were very clear we wanted to capture. Zoya is making it sound simple, but I think a lot of it has come from Zoya herself.

Zoya, how much did reading The Archies as a kid shape and impact your sensibilities that we can find in the film?

Zoya Akhtar with the cast

Zoya: A lot of it, a lot of it. You can see it even in a lot of the shot-taking, in the sense of framing... how classic it is, how wide it is.... In the older films, if you notice, the framing came from the comic.

The trailer has so many nostalgic pulls for our generation, whether it is a bottle of Gold Spot, the cafe which the kids visit and even the clothes and hair that belong to the era. What did you have the most fun putting in?

Zoya: It is my film, so it is very tough to pull a favourite bit out. But the thing with The Archies comic book is that it always seems fresh. Their friendship seemed fun. Everything also was very green. If you see an Archie comic, there’s a lot of green through it. And I think those things stay with you. And like I said, the framing, the vibe, the cheekiness, the innocence, the simplicity of those stories....
Reema: That was a time when less was more. It is so difficult to explain that to kids today, who live in a digital world. It is tough to make them understand that Archie Comics was the only thing we had.
Zoya: I knew that I wanted that milkshake in film to look like what it felt for me when I was reading those comics. I could stare at that milkshake, I could stare at those cakes for hours. Those kind of things were Archie Comics for me.
Reema: For me, it is the innocence. It is also about looking back to a time when one didn’t have so much. Now when we look back, it feels so wholesome, as compared to today when we have it all but it seems all too fractured. That’s what speaks to me.

The central conflict of the film is Archie and his gang trying to save a green space that they hold dear, from commercialisation. Why set it in a hill station and not a city where the lack of greenery is so much more? Also, why set it in the Anglo-Indian community?

Zoya: The thing about setting it in a city when you are doing a period film is that you don’t have that kind of space to shoot. You don’t have that architecture. It may be there, but it is set in pockets. So making a period film in a city calls for a lot of VFX work and that changes the whole scale of the film. We didn’t want that. We wanted it to be an easy, organic film.

We wanted to set it in a community that would allow us to have names like Archie Andrews and Betty Cooper. Also culturally, whether it is food, dance or music, Anglo-Indians lend themselves easily to the story.

We opted for the hills because it is pretty, there is space, there was that kind of architecture... our references were hilly places ike McCluskieganj and Landour.

At the end, the trailer says: ‘You are never too young to change the world.’ It is a very loaded statement but done in a light, entertaining way. What went into creating that balance?

Zoya: When you look back at the music, the fashion, the books and the attitude of that time, the ’60s had a certain freedom. When rock ’n’ roll came, it came in with a certain amount of rebellion and idealism and an idea that you can change the world. Things that led to Woodstock, things that led to the Peace Movement.... There was a certain abandonment of the constraints and the feeling of ‘we can do it’.

To capture that era, in a very baby, very simple, very Young Adult way of an Archie comic was the challenge. So that’s where it came from.

Do the two of you still have your stack of Archie Comics? Did you go back to them while making the film?

Zoya: We do, and Netflix kindly got us more period comics. There are lines in the film that are taken straight up from Archie Comics.

Do you view them differently now? Like we loved Tintin for what it was and now we realise so much of it is politically incorrect, among other things...

Zoya: Even Archies has things like that. But we have tried to address them. We have addressed them very subtly. We have just done what we wanted, which works today.

But at the same time, it is, it is resonant of that period. You can’t look back at history from the lens today and be like: ‘Why was it that way?’ If it was that way, it was that way. Today it is this way. Thirty years later, people are going to look back and say: ‘What the hell were they doing?!’ So I mean, it is what it is, you know, and we just have to retain the simplicity, the innocence and the nostalgia, but do it thematically with what affects kids today and speak to them in their language.

Every member of your young cast, for which this is their debut film, seem perfect for their roles. You have mentioned how they had to go through a boot camp before the film, but did anyone of them bring in anything on set that surprised you?

Zoya: All seven (Agastya Nanda, Suhana Khan, Khushi Kapoor, Vedang Raina, Mihir Ahuja, DOT, Yuvraj Menda) of them did! Not just seven, there are so many of other kids in the film and personally, I was quite blown. They are fantastic!

Yes, I put them in training and yes, they were doing boot camp, but to come out of it like that... they are too good!

Did you learn anything from them?

Zoya: I am so lucky that looking at them I got that early enthusiasm back. It is their first film and they came in with a certain puppy energy which is very contagious. That is what was very nice for me to experience. And I got that from them.
Reema: What Zoya is saying, it is nice to have that kind of enthusiasm. Not people who are jaded but people who are kind of doing it for the first time.

I remember when when I landed up in Ooty for the shoot. In the lift, I would keeping meeting these kids — someone was going for skating class, another for guitar lessons.... There was so much enthusiasm that it was infectious.

So that wholesomeness vibe of the film was also present off set?

Zoya: Yes, very much. They are such a sweet bunch and have great camaraderie between them. They have also formed an off-set Archies gang, which is so heartening to see.

The screening of The Archies’ trailer was carried out in a carnival-like atmosphere. We loved!

What better way to be welcomed than by this sign that instantly took me back to my childhood?

Trivia: who plays the drums in the Archies gang? Answer: Jughead Jones. Occupying pride of place at the screening was this drum kit and, of course, a guitar, played by our main man Archie Andrews

This treasure trove of Archies titles is a delight for every fan

Anyone who has spent their growing-up years pored over Archie digests would dream of hanging out at Pop Tate's. Well, we did... with a lot of delish bites on offer

Anyone who has spent their growing-up years pored over Archie digests would dream of hanging out at Pop Tate's. Well, we did... with a lot of delish bites on offer

Who is your favourite character in Archie Comics and why?

Tell t2@abp.in