Ritu is a filmmaker, actor, and founder of Durga Entertainment, a New York based production company committed to telling nuanced stories, with a focus on women of color and underrepresented voices in leading roles.
Born in Jharkhand, India, Ritu’s early life challenged her to confront the sexist norms around her. Her unconventional experiences as a social activist, military cadet, Miss India finalist, and actor allowed her to explore the many facets of feminism, female, and human identity. Seeking artistic freedom, she left a burgeoning acting career in Mumbai and moved to New York to study with veterans like Austin Pendleton, Anthony Abeson, and Terry Schreiber, but instead found herself boxed in by the narrow and self-effacing roles offered to women of color.
Energized by this challenge, and struck by the extent of dilution that plagues foreign perspectives in American media, she began developing and producing films that transcend industry stereotypes – creating from the in-between: that space where identity isn’t singular or fixed, where women have the freedom to actively unmake and remake themselves, where the personal and political meet in intimate, evolving ways, and where storytelling becomes an act of reclaiming ourselves.
Ritu’s experiences as a filmmaker, actor, humanitarian, mother, South Asian woman, and immigrant shape the lens through which she tells stories.
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