Soumya Sadanandan – Malayalam female film director of Mangalyam Thanthunanena fame

Soumya Sadanandan is a Malayalam anchor & actress turned film director. She was also a radio jockey. She marked her film debut with Kunchacko Boban and Nimisha Sajayan starrer Mangalyam Thanthunanena in 2018 and the movie fared well at box office. Soumya has been cherishing her dreams to become a filmmaker for a long time, and it took a lot of efforts to finally see her dreams come true. She is the director of a documentary film titled Chembai: My Discovery of a Legend which won Special Jury Award at National Film awards in 2018. She played the female lead in David & Goliath, co-starring Jayasurya and Anoop Menon.

Soumya Sadanandan is a native of Sooranad, Kollam District, born in 1985. Her father is a retired employee of KSRTC while her mother worked as a teacher. Her younger days were spent in the capital city, where both her parents worked. Since young she watched movies shown on Doordarshan and was also a story teller, who loves to add her own lines. Telling stories to friends remained one of her favourite pastimes. It was during her engineering days at Government Engineering College, Thiruvananthapuram when film bug bit her, and she started dreaming to become a film director.

Though she tried to join FTII, Pune to study filmmaking she couldn’t get through. It took long 8 years of attempts and hard work to finally see her dream come true. For this mission she worked as an assistant director and also played small roles on screen. She even left her secure job at Bangalore to pursue a career in films, and has also anchored a few shows on television. She joined film industry in 2010.

Soumya Sadanandan – Some interesting and less-known facts

1. Her debut documentary film Chembai: My Discovery of a Legend won Best Documentary at Allahabad International film festival and many other awards. It was shown at different film festivals.

2. Her short film, Rabbit Hole won several awards at Eastern Global Short Film Festival 2018.

3. She completed Electrical & Electronics Engineering from Government Engineering College, Thiruvananthapuram.

4. She anchored KAPPA TV’s show, ‘Film Lounge’ for 4 years between 2013 and 2017.

5. She played brief roles in Malayalam films – Ormayundo Ee Mukham, Mili, Abrahaminte Santhathikal, Cinema Company etc.

6. She played a brief role in 2013 Tamil film, Ceylon.

7. She worked for four years in IT sector before joining films. She was first seen in Cinema Company.