Taapsee Pannu questions Bollywood’s ‘same actors’ formula: ‘All the rom-coms, glam stuff looks the same’ | Interview
Here's the latest update from the Bollywood world:
Taapsee Pannu has often spoken about how an star can get boxed into a certain image once audiences and filmmakers associate them with a particular kind of role. After years of playing strong, intense characters, she feels that perception can sometimes be a limitation. In a recent chat with Hindustan Times, the star spoke about Gandhari , the creative bankruptcy in Bollywood and why the industry only offers her certain kinds of roles.
Adding to this, Taapsee Pannu says Bollywood films look the same: ‘There are only those four or five actors’. What Gandhari gave her For Taapsee, the conversation around casting is not limited to the kind of stories actors are offered. She feels that an star’s appearance can also shape how filmmakers picture them in a role. “When it comes to certain visuals of a character, it's a lot to do with vanity more than how that star is born and looks,” she says.
Meanwhile, Gandhari gave Taapsee a chance to break away from that image. She plays Bani, a mother desperately searching for her kidnapped daughter, and her journey takes her into the unsettling world of Joypurra, where she uncovers a series of disturbing truths.
Notably, A big part of her transformation stemmed from how Bani was visually created. Taapsee credits her hair, makeup and costume teams for helping her look completely different from her usual self. “I would like to take the credit, not just myself, but with my look-creating people — the hair, makeup, costume — to be able to make me look like Bani in this movie, because I'm nowhere close to her in real life, how I look,” she adds. “Even on my worst stress days, I will not look like that.”
As per the latest buzz, That, she feels, is how an star should approach a character. You do not necessarily have to look like the person you are playing in real life. Sometimes it is the story and world of the movie that determine what the character should look like. “It’s the character and the world that demanded me to look like that,” she says.
In further updates, Taapsee also believes that Bollywood 's casting choices play a role in why so many films today end up feeling similar. She feels that filmmakers often return to the same actors for similar stories, leaving little room for a fresh combination of star and character. If the industry wants its films to feel different, she believes the casting needs to change, too.
On top of that, “All the rom-coms, glam stuff looks the same because there are only those four or five actors, actresses who are doing that. All our thrillers look and feel the same because there are only those four or five actors who are doing that,” she says. “If you really want your movie to look different, something new, something different, then you need to cast people who can bring that difference on screen.”
For Taapsee, putting a familiar star in a different outfit or changing their styling does not necessarily make the character feel new. The audience already has a certain image of an star, and that stays with them even when the appearance changes. “If I've seen someone in a glamorous role, now you make that person wear a sari or a bikini or whatever, I have seen the glamour of that star. It's only different, right?” she adds. “So that's not the fault of that poor star, also.”
Source: Hindustan Times