We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Megh Patil a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Megh, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

One of the most meaningful projects I’ve worked on was a short film called Cub, which I directed during a filmmaking summer programme in Italy in 2023.

We shot it in Calabria with a 70-year-old Italian theatre actor, Capitano, and a 7-year-old girl, Vittoria. Neither of them spoke English—and none of us on the crew spoke Italian. My Italian was basically limited to ordering a gelato. The crew was beautifully international: a Kenyan DOP, a German AD, and me as the Indian director—with Google Translate holding us all together.

The story I’d written was based on a local fable, reimagined as a dark, psychological piece about a hunter who’s grown too old to hunt for his cannibal daughter. I wanted to explore emotional repression and the quiet weight of sacrifice. But explaining all that across a language barrier—especially the more abstract, internal stuff—wasn’t easy.

Still, over time, and with a lot of gestures, bad translations, and shared silences, Capitano and I started to click. We had long conversations about responsibility, aging, and what it means to carry pain quietly. Eventually, he made this beautiful choice—to play the character’s inner chaos with a calm, serene exterior. It was a subtle decision, but it gave the story so much depth.

What made this project so special was how we all leaned into the challenge. None of us spoke the same language, but we built a creative shorthand based on trust, instinct, and emotion. By the end, we weren’t just making a film—we were jamming like kids, bridging cultural and generational gaps through pure collaboration.

That experience reminded me why I love directing—especially working with actors. It’s about building a space where people feel safe enough to be honest. And honestly? I thrive in that kind of collaborative chaos.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I fell in love with films at a very young age. I was really passionate about acting, but I wasn’t getting any projects as a teenager. So I started writing short films—initially just to have something to act in. But that process ended up sparking my passion for storytelling. I got obsessed with crafting characters in messed-up situations, and that’s what slowly pulled me toward filmmaking.

At the time, I was doing a business administration degree. But in my second year, the pandemic hit and everything went remote. That’s when, through a mutual friend, I got the opportunity to intern on a feature film in India. And from there, things just snowballed—project after project as an AD, learning on the go, getting addicted to set life.

Since then, I’ve worked on a range of projects as an AD, including as 2nd AD on Mismatched Season 3 for Netflix, which gave me practical, hands-on knowledge of how big sets operate. From managing logistics to adapting quickly when things went off-script, those experiences taught me how to problem-solve under pressure and keep the creative flow intact.

My love for acting never really left. I started helping out a theatre group—AKVarious—as a stage manager. They eventually gave me a chance to act in their productions too. That experience gave me a deeper understanding of performance—from the inside out—and shaped the way I now approach directing actors. It made those interactions feel organic and intuitive, rooted in trust and collaboration rather than instruction.

That—and dark, twisted stories. I’m a sucker for them. It started with David Fincher, then spiralled into Martin McDonagh and Yorgos Lanthimos. An interesting bunch, for sure.

Right now, at 23, I’m pursuing my MFA in Directing at the American Film Institute Conservatory, where I’m focused on crafting performance-led, emotionally driven short films. I hope to tell stories with a deep emotional core—layered with the absurd, the uncomfortable, and the uncanny. Characters who are raw, flawed, sometimes terrible—but painfully human. That’s the space I’m drawn to. That’s where I think my voice lives.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

As a kid, I had a tough time expressing myself. That thread carried into my early years of playwriting in high school—it became my way of making sense of what I felt but couldn’t always articulate, especially when I couldn’t figure out how to communicate a story out loud. Over time, that need to express turned into a deep curiosity about human behavior. Why do people do what they do? What drives them?

As I grew up, I wasn’t exposed to much culture beyond the city I lived in. My world felt limited—tight boundaries, familiar stories, and little access to ideas or art from elsewhere. But I knew I had to broaden my scope. That’s what drew me most to character-driven stories. I became fascinated by the psychology of people—how their contradictions shape them—and how, even in the most specific situations, those emotions can feel universally relatable. Storytelling became my way of reaching beyond my surroundings and stepping into the minds of others.

Still, I never imagined that my films would one day be watched—let alone emotionally understood—by people from entirely different parts of the world. So when I had the chance to screen a few of them for locals across various towns in Italy, it felt surreal. These were people who didn’t speak my language, hadn’t lived my experiences, and yet they found something familiar in what I had created. That moment stayed with me.

That’s the most rewarding part of being a filmmaker: realizing that something so personal, written in solitude, can resonate far beyond its origin. That reminder—that stories can transcend geography, language, and culture—is what fuels my desire to keep creating.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

Six years ago, I had no idea who to look at for mentorship. I was trying to break into an industry without even knowing where the doors were. My mentors changed every six months—mostly out of necessity rather than choice. I remember trying to get an acting gig through a mutual friend. It was a small part in a short film—I was told I’d play the love interest of the lead. Every day, I’d drive an hour to set because he promised, “We’ll shoot your scene today.” But for the longest time, I just ended up holding a styrofoam board or operating the boom mic.

And when the day finally came—it was a single shot. A reaction to the protagonist’s lines.

It was a great learning experience. But I wish I had been exposed to more creatives earlier on. I wish I had the chance to really choose my mentors—people I looked up to, whose work resonated with me.

That’s why I think the best way society can support artists is by creating consistent, accessible ecosystems—especially for underrepresented communities that don’t have access to the big cities. Workshops, screenings, and Q&A sessions can go such a long way in places where exposure to the arts is limited. Sometimes just hearing someone share their creative journey is enough to light that first spark.

I also think there’s something incredibly powerful about cross-cultural collaborations—when artists from completely different backgrounds come together and learn from each other. That exchange not only broadens our creative lens but also makes the stories we tell more nuanced, more human.

We often romanticize the struggle, but what we really need is support that’s built to last—support that prioritizes access, empathy, and artistic growth over gatekeeping.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @patil_megh
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/megh-patil-413b63310