Deba Hekmat plunges head-first in Last Swim

WORDS Maxine Williams
PHOTOGRAPHY Jasmine Engel-Malone
STYLING Baillie Jones
MUA Rocio Cuenca using Gucci Beauty
PRODUCTION Chiara Maculan
SPECIAL THANKS to London Irish Centre & Christelle and Co PR
COVER Deba Hekmat wears Full Look by Gucci, Tights by Wolford

Sweltering heat, crowded corridors of excited and anxious students, brown envelopes and the first taste of freedom. A-Level results day for most young people is the first promise towards a future of endless possibilities. It signals a new beginning but also the end of a certain familiarity which can stir up feelings of anxiety and heartache. These are just some of the themes that Sasha Nathwani – a multi-heritage filmmaker from Britain, Iran, and India – tackles in his emotional debut, Last Swim. The film follows Ziba, played by newcomer Deba Hekmat, a bright youngster who’s smashed her exams and secured a place at University College London to study astrophysics. On the surface, Ziba has everything to look forward to, she’s ambitious, driven and intelligent; however, a mysterious illness which we are introduced to at the start is set to disrupt that.   

The film, which premiered at the Berlinale and won the prestigious Crystal Bear award, is an eclectic blend of Nathwani’s Persian heritage and youth culture in London, with the city acting as an essential character. With Olan Collardy as Director of Photography (known for his work on Rye Lane) each frame bursts with colour and vibrancy, showcasing a London which often feels neglected in modern-day depictions of the city. The set design is littered with trinkets and other emblems of youth that feel familiar: Polaroid pics with friends, fairy lights, and school books scattered across the room. There are various montages that range from Ziba alone in her bedroom the morning of results day, to later in the day with her friends as they splash around in a park pond. Notably, these scenes highlight the duality of youth. The combination of an upbeat soundtrack which features music from the likes of Fred Again and King Krule, accompanied with quick cuts between frames that perfectly encapsulate the excitement of our teenage years and the confusion of adulthood on the horizon.   

On a rainy day in late January, I turned up at the London Irish Centre to catch up with Sasha Nathwani and Deba Hekmat near the end of their BRICKS photoshoot. It’s rare nowadays to see a newcomer command such presence on screen in just a few looks, knowing that – as Sasha and Deba explain below – all of the character’s vulnerability is raw and authentic. As I arrive at the photoshoot, Deba stands in front of a coloured backdrop, posing. Having modelled since she was 15, she’s comfortable and relaxed in front of the camera. With an extensive portfolio, the Kurdish-born British model and actor has worked with brands from Vivienne Westwood to Marc Jacobs, Mulberry, and Vetements. Plus, she took centre stage in Gucci’s SS25 Campaign, Where Light Finds Us, directed by Xavier Dolan. Although she is in a familiar environment, what brings her here is different; Deba is here posed as an actor, not a model. A newcomer who is a veteran in front of the camera but a fresh newbie on an exciting new path as an actor, with the director helping her take her first steps.    

Below, BRICKS speaks to the actor and director about their home town of London, heritage as a source of endless inspiration, and the importance of telling your friends that you love them.   

Max: Sasha, How did this film come about? What were some of your inspirations?   

Sasha: I started writing in 2020 during the lockdown. It’s not a pandemic film, but rather this idea of young people having a short amount of time to kind of reclaim their youth, because the world was closing down, opening up and closing down again. I wanted to know if, in a more pressured scenario, if you had 24 hours to reclaim your youth, how would you spend that time?   

My favourite references and coming of age stories are Larry Clark’s Kids, which is obviously a very raw film and [films like] Good Will Hunting. They tended to all be American films, so when I decided what I wanted my first one to be, I wanted it to be a coming of age story, but set here in London.  

Max: Deba, how did you first hear of the project?  

Deba: Well, it all starts with an email. When I went for the audition, I was like, “Oh no. that went horribly, horribly wrong”, but with the email I was just excited. 

Max: What was it about Ziba’s character that drew you to her?  

Deba: The first thing was the name. My name is Deba. Her name is Ziba… the parallels were crazy. I’m Kurdish from Iran. She’s Iranian but with all of these crossovers in terms of culture, language, the way we are, the way we were both raised! Similar but different.

I would say that I’ve been raised by my mother, even though my dad was present. And I feel like that’s the same with Ziba.  We’ve got so much love for these women in our lives. The scenes with the aunties and the uncles is something that I heavily resonate with because my mum’s always got her sisters over. Also just to be able to play somebody really smart was different for me.  

Max: The film is about Ziba and what she’s experiencing in those 24 hours, but also central to that is the relationship she has with the other people around her. that way. What was it like working with the other actors?  

Deba: It makes me so happy when people clock onto the theme of friendship in the film. As much as it’s about lost youth and reclaiming [that] and this heavy darkness that the film has, it’s just as much about spending time with your friends and loving your friends. It was just really important that we showed that on screen. I was nervous that maybe we weren’t all going to get along the way that we did but it felt like we’d known each other for ages.  

Max: Where do you think that closeness came from?  

Deba: We trusted each other. I think from day one, we all decided that we were going to trust each other, because that’s a choice that you make as well, right? Are you willing to give all of yourself to your co-workers and to your colleagues and everyone? We decided that we were going to put all of ourselves into it.   

Then on top of that, shooting originally was supposed to take place a year before. That being halted gave us more time with each other. We met up a few times before shooting. So that was really, really helpful.   

Max: How did you cultivate that relationship on set as the director? 

Sasha: As Deba said, we were green lit in September of 2022. It’s a summer film so we missed our window to shoot, so we ended up shooting the following May and June. It meant that I had nine months where I spent most of my time with Deba. In twos and threes, I would bring the others  together. We spent a lot of time with Lydia [Fleming], who played Tara. It was really important that the girls had that best friend dynamic. I spent a good amount of time with the boys (Solly Mcleod, Jay Lycurgo, Denzel Baidoo). I made a point of separating the boys from the girls a little bit.   

When we came to shooting, they were like their own crew. They were so in tune with one another, it actually became frustrating for me as a director. I kept telling them to save [their] energy for the take! Jay, for instance, who played Merf is like a ball of energy. They’d be doing cartwheels in between takes, and I felt like a school teacher constantly cracking the whip.   

What’s very distinguishing about this generation of young people is they challenge you. We did a lot of rehearsals and some script development. If there’s something that they didn’t feel was right, they would openly challenge me. I was very happy to give them that room to express themselves. When they took ownership of the characters, that’s the thing that’s most honest and true in terms of their performances.  

We trusted each other. I think from day one, we all decided that we were going to trust each other, because that’s a choice that you make as well, right? Are you willing to give all of yourself to your co-workers and to your colleagues and everyone? We decided that we were going to put all of ourselves into it.   

Deba Hekmat

Max: This is your first feature film, right? Do you think that that was the best way it could have gone; for it to be as collaborative as it was? 

Sasha: I think so. I mean, the actors have to do the work. Deba went away and she did the work. For instance, she’s Kurdish, the character is Iranian. So the character speaks Farsi. Deba didn’t speak Farsi. She learnt Farsi. We got her a dialect coach as well.  

I think the best performances you see in films are where the directors have given the actors the room to improvise, room to express themselves. You can’t really write that. That has to be something that they play with, live in the room.   

Max: What was the process of learning Farsi for the role?  

Deba: Lots of phone calls to my mum! Lots of calls to Narges [Rashidi]. Having her help me with my Farsi was the most important element for me. We’d be on FaceTime with each other, and I’d say a sentence, and she’d cut me off and be like, No, again. And again, and again. She really held me down, kept me in place. Even on set, if I was slipping up, she was right there to correct me and to teach me. Having her by my side was really important.  

Max: You had only done one film before this, which was Luna Carmoon’s Hoard. Going into this you’re the lead, which is a huge deal for any actor, but especially one who hasn’t necessarily had years and years of experience. What was it like working with actors on set who had more experience than you, despite the fact that you were the lead?  

Deba: In all honesty, I don’t think I understood or comprehended the scale… not even what was expected of me, but I just didn’t comprehend what we were doing. I was very naive! I was, like, we’re making a film! What could go wrong? [laughs]. Spending the initial first week when we just had a studio space to practice and bond, that’s when I realised, “Oh, I’m in over my head.” Just watching everybody else and the way they work, the way they snap into character was very different to me. I feel like everybody has a process. I’m still trying to figure out my process.   

My process was going to Burgess Park and sitting on a hill and reading my lines, and that seemed to work for me. But I know that’s not “a process”, so to speak. They helped me realise that everybody works in a different way and there’s no right or wrong way of working.   

If there’s anything to take away from this film, it’s that friendship is so important. Go tell your friends that you love them. Spend time with them. Time is so special.   

Deba Hekmat

Max: There’s a lot of incredible vulnerability with both Deba individually, and her character Ziba but also with the other characters. How did you get that out of Deba specifically? 

Sasha: We did a few different things. We had a little graph of ups and downs, which represented the day that the character was having. Because the character is a sick person, we spoke about what you feel when you have a toothache, for instance. How if you’re doing nothing, the pain is much more pronounced, but when you’re in the company of your friends and you’re laughing and messing around, you forget that it’s there. But she’s also masking. The film alternates between when she’s with the other characters but then we spend a lot of time with her when she’s on her own. I think that giving the film a single perspective approach meant that you’re always with her.   

In the audition we actually did the diagnosis scene, which ended up being a very small scene in the film, but we just kept the camera on her face. We asked her to communicate this loss of hope without any lines, just with the way that she reacts while you hear the diagnosis unfold. And she did the most incredible, powerful audition, we knew then that she was the right person for Ziba. She expresses that same kind of instinctive emotion throughout the film.   

Max: Everyone’s got their own process, and that clearly works. As Sasha said, you do have that. And I think it’s a rarity. Especially because a lot of actors nowadays who are big and have a lot of screen time tend to be classically trained, and I often find that it’s quite hard to see “the thing” of their own within their characters, but you brought that to the role really well.  

Finally, the film is coming out in April. What do you want audiences to take away from?  

Sasha: I just want young people to see it, and I hope they see themselves represented, regardless of their background. Growing up, all of the films about young British people tended to be a very specific type of film about a certain kind of person, whereas we just wanted to tell a story about a friendship circle that could be any friendship circle. I hope it also celebrates all of the good things about Britain and London and the UK. And when the sun shines here it is a really special place to be.  

Deba: The tagline of my friend’s brand is, “tell your friends that you love them”. If there’s anything to take away from this film, it’s that friendship is so important. Go tell your friends that you love them. Spend time with them. Time is so special.   

Last Swim is out in cinemas in the UK and Ireland today.

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