05 July,2026 08:06 AM IST | Mumbai | Mohar Basu
Amita Madhvani
Fifteen years ago, producer Amita Madhvani (of Neerja, Aarya fame) wrote a musical about a young dancer chasing fame in Mumbai. It was supposed to be a stage spectacle. "Think Broadway. Think live musicians. Think dancers stepping into the spotlight every evening to tell the story of a young woman finding herself amid the noise of the city," she paints a picture for us. The project was called Mohini.
For years, it remained on paper. Then, technology caught up with the dream.
Today, Mohini exists as a 12-part AI-powered microseries, one of the more unusual storytelling experiments to emerge from India's entertainment ecosystem. Created by Madhvani and her team after months of learning Google's AI tools, building characters from scratch and training visual consistency frame by frame, the series represents a collision of two seemingly opposite worlds, old-school storytelling and cutting-edge technology.
The irony isn't lost on Madhvani. The woman speaking passionately about Gemini, character generation and AI workflows, also lights up while talking about theatre, handwritten lyrics, Madhuri Dixit and the magic of old Hindi film songs. "AI itself is young. But, in any and every format, we are all learning," she says.
That curiosity has defined much of Madhvani's professional life. Before she became a producer, she spent years in events. At 46, she launched a fitness studio. She has started several businesses, creative ventures and production without allowing herself to become too attached to any one identity. "I follow my calling," she says. "At 46, I opened a fitness studio. Before that, I was into events for 10 years. Now, I am a creator. I hadn't done this. So I am doing this. And I am enjoying it."
That appetite for reinvention eventually brought her back to Mohini. Written roughly a decade-and-half years ago, the story follows a young dancer navigating ambition and the seductive pull of validation. Madhvani describes it as a classic coming-of-age musical.
"It was always written as a stage musical," she recalls. She envisioned live musicians, multilingual subtitles and audiences gathering around this experience - entertainment in its simplest, oldest form. "I wanted to reinvent all of that," she says. "People could get down from the train station and watch. It was as simple as entertainment used to be. They used to sing and narrate the whole story."
Then, the AI boom took the industry by surprise. Unlike many industry veterans who reacted with suspicion, Madhvani's instinct was to experiment. "We are not scared of technology," she says matter-of-factly. Her team began using AI for scheduling and workflow management. Around the same time, Google was conducting workshops introducing creators to emerging AI capabilities. Madhvani and her collaborators - Mamata and Aditya - attended.
What followed was months of toil. The learning curve was steep. The script was already written in Hindi. The characters existed in Madhvani's imagination. Translating that world into AI required something far more complicated than simply entering prompts.
First came the characters. Who was Mohini? What was the emotional language of the world? Every detail had to be fed into the system. "You literally go back to the storybook," she says. "Because you have to feed this information so there is consistency."
The team spent months wrestling with continuity. If Mohini twirled in one shot, her movement needed to flow naturally into the next. If a character opened a door, the transition had to feel seamless. What fascinated her even more was the cultural challenge. Most AI models arrived carrying Western visual references and datasets. "I wanted the database somewhere deep down to have Indian characters and culture," she says.
The result is an Indian story about a young Indian woman. She is dealing with loneliness, insecurity, and the pressure of becoming somebody. She takes trains. She auditions. She doubts herself. She is consumed by her love for dance.
The idea emerged from a concern Madhvani has about younger audiences and the emotional noise surrounding them. Attention spans may be shrinking, but she believes emotional needs remain unchanged. "I want to reach them with things that resonate," she says. "This is not a show where there is a drastic cliffhanger. Keep it gentle. Talk about life. They need that."
Music plays a crucial role in achieving that texture. Madhvani wrote the songs herself. "My biggest joy in life has been lyrics. Mohini expresses with music. The team explored AI-generated music and background scores while constantly evaluating what felt best suited. If something possessed soul, it stayed in the series."
On the first glimpse of Mohini, you think of Madhuri Dixit. Madhvani laughs and says, "Oh yes, Madhuri is Mohini. There is no question about that."
Now, as Mohini finds an audience online, Madhvani's ambitions are expanding again. Season Two is already in development. For now, she seems content watching Mohini finally step onto a stage.
It just happens to be a screen that fits in the palm of your hand.
