Holding her own in the all-star cast of Christopher Nolan's Tenet, Dimple Kapadia showed again why she is counted among the finest of her generation. Shortly after Nolan had announced the project in May 2019, Kapadia's talent manager Purvi Lavingia Vats had told mid-day that convincing the actor for the screen test wasn't easy.

Cut to over a year later: the actor, 63, is sitting pretty with an envy-inducing Hollywood biggie on her résumé and the strength of having overcome her mental block against screen tests. "Auditioning has nothing to do with an actor's faith in his calibre. My first reaction was 'I don't do auditions'. It was frightening because I had never done one before. In hindsight, I am glad I finally did the screen test. It was a mental block that stemmed from my insecurities and fear of rejection, and I needed to overcome it," admits Kapadia.