India's finest actor Tabu speaks about being an insider in Bollywood

Tabu at the third edition of Sit With Hitlist before a live audience at the midday office PicsNimesh DaveIts rather easy to hold a freewheeling conversation with Tabu Heres why Shes been around for over three decades having done over 80 films which would mean a fair number of postrelease rounds of press interviews across newsentertainment media And yet its incredible how little we know about her The mystique aura whether planned or not remains And we can actually begin the chat with the most basic query on her name Hence the first question and similar ones that followExcerpts from the conversationYoure Tabassum Fatima Hashmi which is a beautiful name How and why did you choose to call yourself Tabu in the first placeIts my pet nameSure but its like Govinda calling himself Chi Chi on screenTabu works though you think When I was working on my first film as a child artiste in Hum Naujawan 1985 Dev Anand Saab thought Tabu was beautiful too and that I should adopt it as my screen name and that just never changed Nobody had ever called me Tabassum except for my teachers and school friends And I came to Bombay right after schoolA common perception is that you started out as an outsider from Hyderabad to showbiz Bombay Goldie Anands wife was your moms friend Shabana Azmis your aunt mums first cousin Youve worked with Dev Anand Shekhar Kapur wished to cast you as a debuting lead Shekhar himself is Dev Anands nephew Clearly youre an insiderThats right I think the impression of me being an outsider comes from the fact that I never intended to be in the movies I showed up here by circumstance accident you can say I went back to school after finishing my first film and I never wanted to come backWere you holidaying in Bombay when you got your first partWe used to come every summer for our holidays because my mums older brother Ishaan Arya was a DoP he shot Garam Hawa 1973 Bazaar 1982 I grew up with his sons Sameer and Sagar we were like siblings My sister Farah and I were at Dev Saabs office where he was taking a screen test and because he thought she was so beautiful he took her screen test as well I did the movie We forgot her screen test She was 16And one day we got a call from Yash Chopra He told my mother about wanting to cast my sister for the film Faasle 1985 since Dev Saab had showed him her screen test My mum didnt know who Yash Chopra was she checked with my aunt Shabana everyone was really excited This is how my sister and mom moved to Bombay and I was too attached to Hyderabad and my school so I stayed back with my aunt for three years By then my sister had done a thousand films and become a big star And due to my sister there was natural curiosity in the industry if Id like to act in films tooShekhar Kapur Uncle saw me said I had to debut in his film Prem which I said no to He insisted that I do just this one film and that he would then send me abroad for further studies Which never happened In fact I did the film and he ran away from the projectThat was a massive debutYeah it was hugeRather early in your career Gulzar called you a combination of Nutan Meena Kumari and Nargis Anyone would fall off their chair hearing thatLong pause I dont know what to say I try and see it from the outside and then hope to do my job wellAnd ideally stay from the traps of showbizMy life is in the showbiz it isnt so separate from my work Yet regardless of my profession I would still remain the same person mdash someone whose internal life is distinct from the madness outside And Ive always been like this through school college It takes me a long time to open up with people media workassociateshellip Its just a personality type I dont have the bandwidth to be out there be everything to everyoneYoure more the boardgame night with close friends kinda personI do that I essentially like being with people I can laugh a lot with And people in the movies unlike in many other professions generally have a sense of humour Theres a common thread of jokes that exist in the film industry with a very specific languageGive us an exampleCut to usne aise bol diya Maine aise bola aur woh stop block mein gayab ho gaya This is still 90s but there are really specific terms Arrey yar yeh toh bahut bada twist aa gaya teri kahani mein Yar kya game kiya usne girlfriend ki life mein Uski band baj gayihellipWhat I find amazing is how film critics go gaga analysing your performances subtext in your work etc But when youre asked about films that you loved doing you say Saajan Chale Sasural 1996 Biwi No 1 1999 and in a recent interview you said Jaal The Trap 2003 Have not even seen Jaal The Trap whats this finest movie youve ever madeLaughs Dont exaggerate I didnt say Jaal The Trap was the finest film ever I think it was a great role for me to do back in 2000 so early in my career nobody had cast me like that Mere role mein twist aa gaya You just havent seen the movie and so you dont know Didnt it look like I was having fun in Biwi No 1In Saajan Chale Sasural the audience had fun I had fun the producers made money it was a fun experience It was a treat to watch Govinda take a scene to other levels On paper it would look like okay this is whats going to happen and its funny But you would never be able to imagine the flavour Govinda would bring to a scene turning it into something so tasty And thats his forteacuteI know someone who hung out with you on the sets of Chandni Bar 2001 What amazed him is that hed be chatting with you youd go off do an intense scene and just come back to continue the chat Does that switching onoff come naturally to youGulzar Saab also used to say the same thing Actually I dont know Ive really not been able to decode the process of acting Ive tried I still dont think Id be able to articulate it the process into a few lines or paragraph At all times thereve too many factors determining what I was doing or how I was doing it mdash the inspirations people I was surrounded by what kind of access I had regarding a roleI also dont think you can carry around what youve given in a shot because theres a finish point with cut and a beginning with action And I dont know what happens between the action and cut Its just in front of the camera after which the moment is overDo you rehearse for that moment though The lines and movement of course you have to rehearse But I really dont know whatll happen in the take Even the director might give you different instructions in subsequent takesI remember Ang Lee doing that for Life Of Pi 2012 He would try the same shot with different interpretations to arrive at what he wants from a scene For different actors different kinds of briefs work I dont know what kind of actor I am Only someone whos observed me may be able to answer this Also Ive come to the conclusion that there is no right or wrong way of doing anything in life mdash as people as well were evolvingIn action sequences you obviously have to rehearse a lot You cant just show up and slap someone Otherwise sometimes you just lose it when you rehearse a lot and at other times you can only get it right once you rehearse a lotCan you recall a character that you rehearsed extensively forYoure taking my examOkay did you rehearse a lot for Ashimas role in The Namesake 2006 We just had one reading in New York I got into the film just two weeks before the shoots start which took me by surprise and I was so not prepared for it To my advantage I had already done a film in Bangla Abar Aranye 2003 with Gautam Ghose Da which I had dubbed myself I had a certain understanding of the culture people and place mdash that really helped a lot during The Namesake I also had a lot of friends to refer to especially since there was no dubbing involved The dialect was Bengali accented English specific to someone whos lived in New York from 19772005But The Namesake was an experience that changed a lot in me There are milestones that you can look back on and this film would be one of them I was in America and didnt know anyone except Irrfan Khan The entire unit was American mdash no one making any filmy jokes I lived in an apartment in New York and the first 10 days were devastating It was cold snowing my sisters were in California and Chicago and I would call them and cry because I could not get my favourite brand of corn flakes in the supermarket I would ask them How come the tea doesnt taste like in California This was my struggle Those are serious first world problems We feel sorry for you No I thought it wouldve been better if I could bring my team along But once we started shoot came into a routine it turned out to be the most valuable experience of my life I made friends We worked five days a week I also learnt the way America approaches cinema acting style of shooting contracts The Screen Actors Guild reps would come and check on us I still get residuals from The Namesake almost twice or thrice a year in dollars Every time we watch The Namesake on TV something goes in your pocketYes you are paying me Thats the way it should be and I really respect that What are the other milestones you can think ofFrom the beginning Then it has to be Maachis 1996 Astitva 2000 Hu Tu Tu 1999 Chandni Bar 2001 and The Namesake because of geographical exploration Then Life Of Pi and Cheeni Kum 2007 in a very nice way Youve said that of all the characters the one in Cheeni Kum has been the closest to you What do you mean by thatThat is one character that I can identify with in the sense that I could be that personMeans you could fall for Amitabh BachchanOf course That is why I did the movie I could totally fall for somebody like that but has to be exactly like him I could totally understand my characters headspace and I guess thats why R Balki wrote the film keeping me in mind Coming back to milestones Haider 2014 and Maqbool 2003 definitely The first milestone for you one imagines would be Maachis and your association with Gulzar The two of you share a fabulous relationship How did you first meetI still dont know what made him Gulzar cast me in Maachis and I still ask him that At the time my song Ruk Ruk Ruk from Vijaypath 1994 and trailers of Pehla Pehla Pyar were on air mdash fullon dancing But he still does not answer my question It is now that I understand that the director and the cinematographer has a completely different perspective on an actor They have an eyeVishal Bhardwaj has had the ability to see me in a very different light I was caught off guard when he approached me with Maqbool It was like a drug to feel that someone looks at you like that He could see the deep layers of madness sexuality lust I felt completely bare with him With Maqbool and Haider I saw and met myself in so many different ways than I had ever known So Gulzar saw you in the promos of Pehla Pehla Pyar and called you upHe called up Shabana aunty I said of course Id give anything to be a part of his film Hes made films like Mausam 1975 and Angoor 1982 in which his characters are so real and still they are the leads So I went to meet him at his house I always narrate this incident as it is the strongest memory that I have So he had a cold and he kept sniffing into his handkerchief I went and sat We both just sat for an hour And I was thinking Kya bolenge yeh mujhe Main kya jawaab doongi Whatll he say I was completely tonguetied Hes sitting across you sniffing and you are just sitting too Im sure he must be reading somethingI think he was writing something and I kept waiting After an hour I said Achha Gulzar saab And he was like Achha thik hai It was his way of saying that you are doing the film Twothree days later he handed me the script which was such an Oh My God moment It was the first time I was holding a script First time holding a script What are you sayingYes after Prem Vijaypath didnt have a script They just told you Aap madam udhar se ayenge or Ruk Ruk Ruk karengeAise dance karne ka aur romace karne ka I was like Yay very good Feels nice to dress up Ajay Devgn is my friend Laughs Outdoor main mazaa karenge will have fun Pehla Pehla Pyar was shot in Switzerland so I was jumping with joy Youre not making this upNo I was just too happy to be on sets Chintuji Rishi Kapoor would offer me chocolate Later he would instruct Seedhe khade reh stand straight But then Gulzaar Saab happened So he read the script to Chandrachur Singh and me I didnt understand what I was doing in the film I couldnt understand anythingWere you intimidatedThe subject was so heavy and deeply political which you would get now You can figure what the film meant to him and what it was saying Gulzaar Saab was obviously there like a fatherfigure and he made it feel like a picnic Then of course my relationship with Gulzar Saab impacted me the most in life I found a home in him Hes somebody completely divorced from the craziness and predictability of the movie industry He also encouraged me to write He would give me blank notebooks and after few months would ask me if the book was over What kind of writingObservations encounters experiences and I would read to him And hed say Bohot achhe beta That meant everything to meIn that sense youd say Maachis probably turned around how you perceived showbusiness in the first place If we see your films before that you really wanted to go to Switzerland and have funI still want to go to Switzerland I think when you experience everything you can enjoy everything You cant do that if you are putting yourself out there for one kind of experience alone Its going to exhaust you and burn you outIs that why you take long sabbaticalsThis line is always thrown at me as an accusation Its a good thing though I recommend itIs there another sabbatical coming upNo Theres so much time between films that I dont have to consciously take a sabbatical Anyway films are so spaced out these days mdash nobody does 10 five or even two films at a timeBut youve done that In 1996 if Im not mistaken you had eight releasesYes I was doing three shifts a day I once had four releases on the same day It was crazy but it was the way it was Also youre much younger and you have much more enthusiasm and energy to be everywhere doing all that a young girl loves mdash wearing good clothes romancing actingWhat are the biggest changes youve seen in showbiz since the time you enteredSocial media Thats the biggest changeCant imagine you being active on social mediaIm on Instagram You dont have to engage opine listen and it doesnt take up that much time Another change is that everything except the actual shoot has become a project Its not just about the film or the product anymore The quality of preparation you put in postshoot and everything else has also come into focus So you dont know where your actual energies are getting distributedSpeaking of distributing energies there was a time that you took a really long break to learn Spanish Were you able to master itThat was over 10 years ago in 2004 I planned to finish everything in a yearandhalf and not work for a year mdash just not do movies for some time But no Ive forgotten Spanish Its Only when I go to California and order food in a restaurant that I get to practice itHow many languages do you knowTelugu I can speak Marathi little bit of Tamil and Malayalam And Bengali fluentlyFor people who love your work and have only seen your Hindi movies mdash could you recommend some of your nonHindi films a retrospective if you mayNinne Pelladata 1996 Telugu Kandukondain Kandukondain 2000 Tamil Iruvar 1997 Tamil Kaalapani 1996 Malayalam Rakkilipattu 2007 Malayalam Andarivaadu 2005 Telugu Abar Aranye 2003 BengaliAudience QuestionsDid you plan how you wish to chalk out your career mdash follow a serious film with a lighthearted oneI dont think my generation of actors was the planning type Because so much was happening I was just doing what I wanted to do mdash sometimes because the money is good or the role is great I did Aamdani Atthani Kharcha Rupaiyaa 2001 for instance especially because Raghavendra Rao was making it That was my second film with him I consider him my guru My first film Coolie No 1 was with him I learnt stuff from him mdash that you should have your own house own money Be careful with your time Always be punctual Do your work and not think about anything else Hes taught me so many things about conduct Always walk properly dress well look nice and beautiful Sleep on time Enjoy life Also he packs up at 530 pm and would take us on picnics in SingaporeNow we know how you can be cajoled into signing up for a film Picnic pe chalte hai picture banayengeShopping karenge Mall mein jayengeI was thinking about Drishyam 2015 There was such a brilliant shift in your character mdash you had to be tough still looking for your missing sonI must say Drishyam is one of the most difficult characters I have done in recent times I knew it was difficult for me to crack because of the conflict in her personalities She had to be this person strict cop and yet the vulnerable mother And there was a danger of her becoming completely dark and negative Which of course was not required because you also have to see the vulnerability I dont think Ive played somebody like her mdash so strong and correct As an audience also youre conflicted between wanting to hate her but also understanding the pain I dont know how I did the role but it was a journeyTranscribed by Mohar Basu Sonil Dedhia and Sonia LullaCatch up on all the latest entertainment news and gossip hereDownload the new midday Android and iOS apps to get updates on all the latest and trending stories on the go