Season 6, Ep. 1: Kal Ho Naa Ho (with Angilee Shah)

Saturday School Podcast

Season 6 of Saturday School (where we explore Asian films about Asian America) kicks off with us inviting one of our favorite people to talk about one of our favorite actors. Journalist Angilee Shah thought we were joking when we asked her to join us to discuss the 2003 film "Kal Ho Naa Ho," because 15 years of friendship hasn't taught her that we don't joke around about these things.

"Kal Ho Naa Ho" is about an Indian American family in Jackson Heights, New York who are struggling, a family friend who arrives from India on a mission to help them get their lives back on track, and a love that lasts multiple lifetimes.

We talk about Angilee's complicated relationship with Bollywood, its history of storylines about NRI characters whose lives are made better by rediscovering India and female characters whose lives are made better by falling in love with Shah Rukh Khan. We also dissect the America-flag-filled dance number "Pretty Woman," a remix of the Roy Orbinson song, to understand the stereotypically multicultural way Indians may have viewed America in the mid-2000s.