Whenever I think of Ayesha Jhulka, I remember the cult film Jo Jeeta Wahi Sikander. I still admire the innocence of her character Anjali in that film. The actress was away from the glitz and glamour for sometime but now she is back with a powerful role in Tanuja Chandra series Hush Hush on Prime Video. In an exclusive conversation with Team MissMalini, Ayesha speaks about watching herself for the first time, controversy revolving around Dalaal and being a part of OTT platform.
Before going further, here’s a look at the promo of Hush Hush:
Excerpts from the interview:
On watching herself for the first time on screen during Kurbaan….
The first time was when we had gone to Igatpuri for the schedule of a song. We were called to the editing room. I remember we were somewhere in Khar. It was my, mom and some people from the unit. When I saw myself for the first time, I felt like is it really me dancing there. To be very honest, I was only looking at my flaws. I always felt that time that I could have done better. It is still the case with me.
On doing Waqt Hamara Hai…
I got that film, Divya Bharti and I were close. She told me that I am suppose to be doing this film. But I want you to do this film. She just loved me and so did I. Somehow that film came to me. She used to come on the set a lot of times. It was Sajid Nadiadwala and the whole team consisting of Akshay Kumar, Anupam Kher, Suniel Shetty, Mamta Kulkarni and Divya Bharti. That film was a lot of fun. I never used to analyze my films, I used to be like if I have heard something, I liked it and I am doing it and I would do it with conviction, come what may.
On learning to act…
After doing Kurbaan, I went to Roshan Taneja’s acting class for a month. There were people like Pooja Bedi, Mukesh Rishi, who were part of my batch. We used to have lot of fun that time. We used to listen to Roshan ji, come back, do our homework. I was young that time, I couldn’t understand the seriousness of things then. One thing that I learnt from there was confidence. A lot of confidence when it comes to public speaking.
On taking a stand for herself while doing a film called Dalaal when she got to know her body double was used without her knowledge for a scene…
I took a very strong stand, I went to great lengths for that and I strongly feel that you have to be very transparent. You cannot be fake with a person when you are signing him/her for the project. I had to take a call if I wanted to do it or not. It saves a lot of drama trauma along with it. I am a strong person and there are some do’s and don’ts in my life and I have always stand by it. I took my decisions in absolute sense. There are somethings ethically not right for me. That was wrong and I was fighting against a big filmmaker. Though it was a super hit film but I had to voice my opinion because it was wrong on the part of producer and director.
On the kind of films that were made in 90’s and now…
Times are changing, things are changing and we need to change with that. OTT is great because the content is fanta-fabulous on this. You can see things that you can’t see in movies at times. Also, people like us who are starving to do something better, something good and different, This is the platform for us. There is nothing like this one is important or that one is important. Everybody is important because even one character, who is coming and doing one scene and going, you will remember that character. It is beautiful times, I think. There is a flipside, too much happening and too many expectations. When we were in that phase, things were calm. The circle was small, projects used to come to us. That was lovely in itself. But this is also very nice. For an actor, nothing has changed in terms of me being on set. Even on the sets of Hush Hush, I was treated beautifully. Even the my and director’s debut on OTT happened with it. The first female director I worked with and everything fell in place. I think this is a lovely time.
You can watch the entire interview here: