BEAUTY WITH BRAINS
Manjhi was mostly shot on real locations rather than sets. Tell us about your experience.
It was great. First of all, the story was amazing and if we had shot the scenes in the Bombay studio imagining the screenplay, it wouldn’t have been possible. I went to the site and it was incredible. The village is so beautiful, yet so underdeveloped and extremely poor.
How did you get into the skin of the character?
It was all my interpretation actually. The story was more about Manjhithan his wife. Nawazuddin researched a lot about his character as well as about Manjhi’s wife, so whatever he told me was on one side and for the rest I added some of my own flavour. Since I was living there, you tend to observe people – how they speak and how they behave.
Bollywood has been known for typecasting actors very easily. With your roles in Badlapur, your short film Ahalya and now Manjhi, did you feel that you’d get typecast as a seductress?
Well, it was different in both Ahalya and Badlapur. I am not a seductress in either of the films. I got molested in Badlapur, so there I wasn’t playing any kind of seductive role (laughs). People judge you depending on whether you have played a glamorous role or not. Almost everyone will think that my role in Manjhiwas very non-glamorous, but I think that my role in this film was very glamorous as well as sensual. So the definition of glamorous needs to be changed; if you think makeup is glamorous, then in ManjhiI have used loads of makeup to look like a typical village girl.
Here I am playing a village girl; in RakhtCharitra again I played a village girl. So there I’ve started getting typecast as a sari-clad woman; which I found very weird. But after Badlapur, I got some big franchisees offering me sex comedies and it was really bizarre because in Badlapur, I found nothing sexual about my role. Maybe they thought that if I stripped, I might play a character in sex comedies as well, but I refused all of them. Yes, I do get typecast. Everybody does, but I’m trying very hard to not to fall into that category.
I came back from London in 2011 after a break and it took me a whole year to just convince people that I can play the role of a city girl too. It was at the end of 2012 that I got Manjhi and Hunterr. Ahalya also played a very important part as nobody would have ever cast me as a seductress. Personally what worked for me is the confidence of the director. The moment the director has faith in you, things become easier.
How much time do you devote to developing a character?
It depends on the character and on the situation. Like for Badlapur, I did not work on developing my character as the role was of a city girl. In Manjhithough, I worked on developing my character, I don’t know if it is authentic or not.
What excites you more – the role, the director or the script?
It depends! Sometimes you have to trust the director and sometimes you have to go through the script too. For example, I did one Hollywood project with AnuragKashyap called Madly. It is a film involving multiple directors and Anurag had to direct one part of the film. He had no script, but he offered me the role and I said yes because I know him so well. I could imagine his vision and I know what he is capable of.
Bollywood is known for objectifying women. What’s your take on that?
Hopefully I won’t be a part of those projects. But things are changing; look at PK, even Badlapur, Dum LagaKeHaisha and NH10 – these are very big commercial films, but they have nothing to do whatsoever with objectifying women.
You have been a part of 7 different language films. What can you tell us about that?
I have done films in Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam, English, Hindi and Marathi. I have also been in a Bengali film. Now I am doing a Tamil film with Rajnikanth, so that’s interesting.
How are regional films different from Bollywood films?
I don’t think there’s much of a difference especially with the kind of films I did. The only difference is the culture as I am not familiar with the culture of the other states. Secondly, you don’t understand the language on the set. You have no idea what’s going on as they all are speaking in their language. So at times it becomes difficult.
You are originally from a theatre background… Has theatre taken a backseat for now?
It has taken a little bit of a backseat now, yes. Earlier I have been doing 4-5 productions at a time, but right now if I start doing it again, then I won’t be able to do films. I have been working on one production – it’s an adaptation of GirishKarnad’sBoiled Beans on Toast and it’s a Marathi adaptation. We did our last show in July and it was on for a year and a half abroad. Now we are starting with an English play in December which has a very good cast. So I am doing theatre, but not like five plays a year.
What are your other interests?
I am a dancer, so I love dancing. Other than dancing I also love travelling, reading, watching films and sometimes cooking.
Recommended for you
