'Cabaret' girl Richa Chadha on leaving her comfort zone for a character
Sanyukta Iyer (MUMBAI MIRROR; March 31, 2016)
From the unabashedly candid Dolly of Dibakar Banerjee's Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye! to Pooja Bhatt's Cabaret star, Richa Chadha has crossed borders from indie to masala movies. And the journey has been far from easy. “When you come from certain aesthetic, it takes a lot to overcome your condescending attitude and understand that commercial cinema can be intelligent too,“ she explains.
After going through the grind of working in a big film with plenty of songs-and-dances, harsh archlights and lip-syncing, it dawned on her that Cabaret was as big a challenge as Gangs Of Wasseypur. However, Richa is quick to point out that her turn as a dancer in the musical, also featuring Gulshan Devaiah, is nothing like the Renee Zellweger and Catherine Zeta Jones-starrer Chicago or Burlesque, featuring Christina Aguilera. “My character is brave, not bold. She's a survivor and a fighter. Pooja's pushed me out of my comfort zone and made me look into a mirror that reflects a face with plenty of make-up,“ she says.
The 29-year-old actress recalls changing costumes in her car as she moved from the Cabaret sets, after filming the climax, to Omung Kumar's Sarabjit biopic, in which she plays Sarabjit's wife. “While combing out the curls and taking off the fake eyelashes, I started mumbling in Punjabi. My driver thought I was going crazy. By the time we reached the location, I had transformed into a seedhi-saadhi Punjabi woman with my accent in place,“ she reminisces, adding that this journey has prepped her up for both sides of the Bollywood game.
Richa didn't have any reservations about playing the Cabaret girl, but Pooja faced resistance from several quarters on her decision to cast the 'arty' Masaan girl. Sometime last year, the filmmaker summoned Richa to Mukul Dev's house for a chat at midnight. She informed Richa that while everybody thought she wasn't right for the part, she knew she had found the ultimate Cabaret girl. “Today, commercial actors are dabbling in my kind of cinema, so I told myself it was time I got out of my comfort zone and slipped on high heels. I never understood what people found sexy about the jhalli girl-turned-old mother to Nawazuddin Siddiqui in Gangs of Wasseypur,“ she laughs.
She admits to feeling vindicated when her last screen outing, debutante director Neeraj Ghaywan's National Award-winning Masaan, clocked a twin win and standing ovation at the Cannes Film Festival. “I shared a picture of my middle finger on social media. That was for all those who had called us 'arty-farty'. The days of a person playing a cop all their life are gone. Goodbye, criticism!“ she exclaims.
After going through the grind of working in a big film with plenty of songs-and-dances, harsh archlights and lip-syncing, it dawned on her that Cabaret was as big a challenge as Gangs Of Wasseypur. However, Richa is quick to point out that her turn as a dancer in the musical, also featuring Gulshan Devaiah, is nothing like the Renee Zellweger and Catherine Zeta Jones-starrer Chicago or Burlesque, featuring Christina Aguilera. “My character is brave, not bold. She's a survivor and a fighter. Pooja's pushed me out of my comfort zone and made me look into a mirror that reflects a face with plenty of make-up,“ she says.
The 29-year-old actress recalls changing costumes in her car as she moved from the Cabaret sets, after filming the climax, to Omung Kumar's Sarabjit biopic, in which she plays Sarabjit's wife. “While combing out the curls and taking off the fake eyelashes, I started mumbling in Punjabi. My driver thought I was going crazy. By the time we reached the location, I had transformed into a seedhi-saadhi Punjabi woman with my accent in place,“ she reminisces, adding that this journey has prepped her up for both sides of the Bollywood game.
Richa didn't have any reservations about playing the Cabaret girl, but Pooja faced resistance from several quarters on her decision to cast the 'arty' Masaan girl. Sometime last year, the filmmaker summoned Richa to Mukul Dev's house for a chat at midnight. She informed Richa that while everybody thought she wasn't right for the part, she knew she had found the ultimate Cabaret girl. “Today, commercial actors are dabbling in my kind of cinema, so I told myself it was time I got out of my comfort zone and slipped on high heels. I never understood what people found sexy about the jhalli girl-turned-old mother to Nawazuddin Siddiqui in Gangs of Wasseypur,“ she laughs.
She admits to feeling vindicated when her last screen outing, debutante director Neeraj Ghaywan's National Award-winning Masaan, clocked a twin win and standing ovation at the Cannes Film Festival. “I shared a picture of my middle finger on social media. That was for all those who had called us 'arty-farty'. The days of a person playing a cop all their life are gone. Goodbye, criticism!“ she exclaims.