I AM READY TO DO INTIMATE SCENES IF THEY ARE SHOT AESTHETICALLY BY THE DIRECTOR

MAHIE GILL tells JYOTHI VENKATESH

In the recently released film Doordarshan , the talented as well as vivacious actress Mahie Gill, who is still being referred to as the Dev D girl left an impact with her involved performance as Priya the housewife married o the character played by Manu Rishi Chaddha. The film which was liked by the audiences when it was released recently theatrically will be recently put on view for the public by one of the OTT platforms as it was abruptly removed from the theatres because of the threat of the corona virus.

I spoke to Mahie Gill sometime ago. Mahie said that she plays the character of a housewife called Priya in the film. “I play Manu Rishi Chaddha’s wife who is loyal, bubbly and devoted to her husband but at the same time is keen on getting divorced from him. The character is a lot like what I am in real life and I did not have to work hard to prepare for it because it was the director who had to understand what I had to portray in the film. All that I did to get into the skin of my character in the film Doordarshan was to do exactly what the director Gagan Puri wanted me to do as an actor and it was just smooth sailing for me and more so because as an actor, I do not like to interfere with what my director says on the sets.”

Mahie adds, “For me the film Doordarshan is nothing but nostalgia with tinted glasses. He shows on Doordarshan way back in the 80’s and 90’s were far ahead of the times. Now everyone is busy in his or her own work and the familial bonds are also no longer there to bind us together like in the past.”

Mahie says that even otherwise, she is not at all a method actress who delivers exactly what dialogues that she has been asked to deliver. “I learnt from director Tigmanshu Dhulia that an actor should not just vomit the dialogues that he or she is being given without understanding the essence for the role that he or she is doing in the film.”

Mahie adds, “As an actor, you are always concerned about how you would interpret your scene. The moment I heard the subject t from Gagan Puri, I knew for sure that he would end up making a good film, because besides the fact that he narrated the subject very nicely, the fact is that he is also a good editor on his own right. I was blessed because Gagan told me that he had conceived the subject keeping me in mind for the role he had assigned me for the film Doordarshan.”

When I asked Mahie whether she felt that she as being short changed as far as her roles are concerned, she philosophically quipped, “It’s all destiny. Each and every actor or human being has his or her destiny pre written for him or her. To add to it, I would say that I am not at all a go getter, To tell the truth, I am a thorough introvert and do not at all like to go out to people and tell them that they should sign on me for a character in their films. I think I am lucky and blessed in the sense that I never even thought that I’d go even so far in my journey as an actor till date.”

Mahie elaborates. “It is eleven years since I had acted in Dev D directed by Anurag Kashyap. I think I must have done even less than 20 films till date in a span of eleven years. I think I’d leave my life satisfied, because I have a good body of work for the future generation to watch. My priorities have always been my script, my role and to what extent will I be able to understand the director and how passionate my director will be on the sets.

Mahie confesses that she had worked with the former cricketer Ajay Jadeja in the film Pal Pal Dil Ke Saath before Anurag Kashyap had approached her with the offer to work in his film Dev D which proved to be a turning point for her as an actress, but it was released only after Dev D was released and Mahie had ended up as a well known star. When asked to name the best films in her actress Mahie Gill considers Dev D first and Sahib Biwi Aur Gangster her second best though she has acted in several films till date.

Among the projects which h Mahie Gill is doing right now, she names Durgavati in which she has been pitted with Bhumi Pednekar and an untitled web series of a period film in which she has been teamed opposite Abhay Deol and directed by Mahesh Manjrekar. Mahie says that it is not for the first time that she is acting in a web series as she has already acted in a web series for Zee5 earlier. Talking about the film Durgavati, Mahie confesses that she is playing a CBI Officer in it whereas Bhumi Pednekar is playing a police officer.

Mahie confesses that she had gone into hibernation in between for quite some time because she was not satisfied at all with the kinds of offers that she was getting which required her to play sensuous roles constantly. “I said no to all of them and decided to lie low, because I wanted to accept only those roles which excited me as an actress when I go to the sets. Thanks to that decision of mine, I think I am able to enjoy my work today wholeheartedly.”

Among the filmmakers who are there in her wish list as an actress, Mahie names Rajkumar Hirani, Vishal Bharadwaj with whom she says she has yet to work and Tigmanshu Dhulia as a director with whom she would love to work again and again. Mahie adds that doing intimate scenes is not at all a problem for her but adds that she is game to shoot for intimate scenes if and only if they are shot aesthetically by the directors.

Mahie feels that it is the right time for actors and actresses to get good work as much is happening. “I am waiting for more good work to come my way. You grow every single day in your life. You learn only by experience which really sets out to teach you a lot by letting you to make mistakes and lean with constant practice”.

Mahie signs off, when I ask her what made a fiercely private person like her confess that she is married with a daughter to boot recently. “I am a private person but when someone asked me whether it was true that I had a daughter, I had to honestly tell him that I have a beautiful daughter, though I still refuse to divulge the name of my husband especially since he is not from this field.”