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| WOMAN IN WHITE: Bipasha Basu pores over and poses with some t2 editions featuring her |
I remember this… it was so much fun! You guys got that lovely cake with me and Emraan (Hashmi) on it… it was so, so special,” smiled Bipasha Basu as she pored over a September 2012 t2 edition featuring her, Emraan and producer-director Mahesh Bhatt at the t2 office to promote their horror film Raaz 3.
On Tuesday evening, Bipasha — looking pretty in an off-white Anarkali and sporting a giant solitaire — was back at the t2 office to promote another horror film: Creature 3D, that hits screens today.
For an hour, the Ballygunge girl chatted on films and family, crushes and relationships, love and marriage.
Priyanka Roy: Is fear the most difficult emotion for an actor to portray, especially in a film like Creature where you are not actually ‘seeing’ your predator?
Bipasha Basu: Fear is a difficult genre to make. Fear of the supernatural and fear of a creature feature are two different kinds. The kind of fear you felt when you watched Jurassic Park, Anaconda or Godzilla is what you feel in Creature. The first time you see the creature you will get scared, but after that, it stays in the film as a character for an hour and 10 minutes… so you can’t get scared of something you see all the time. But it’s the power of the beast that’s scary. The crux of a creature feature all over the world is ‘Run! Save your life’. In this film, there are six big sequences with the creature and those are the highlights… the last 45 minutes are a roller coaster... it never stops.
If we do this right, it opens up a whole new genre in the Hindi film business. I keep getting asked: ‘Can we compare it to the West?’ My answer is: ‘If you pitch the creature of our film against any creature in an international film, it’s just as good. When I signed on the film, I was worried that if the creature doesn’t work, then nothing works. But thankfully, our creature is fab and I am very happy to be proud of this film. Once people come in, I am sure they will have a good time.
Priyanka: Are you a fan of creature films because you said in a recent t2 interview that horror is not your cup of tea…
Bipasha: I watch horror films… but in various ridiculous ways! Horror is something we are all scared of and yet it entertains. Creature is a film in which I didn’t see myself first. When I watched it, I was so taken in by the sequences and the creature… I was exactly an audience when I watched it for the first time.
Debdeep Banerjee (third year, mass communication and videography, St. Xavier’s College, and a member of the t2 Campus Team): I am a fan of horror films…
Bipasha: International horror films?
Debdeep: Both Indian and international…
Bipasha: You can’t compare our horror films with theirs because the audience for international horror films has seen it all and their level is much higher. For our audience, we have to pack in a good story and great songs with the horror elements because we cater to a larger audience. My younger sister Bijoyeta has watched every horror film possible and when she sees my films, she asks me: ‘Do people actually get scared seeing this?!’ (Laughs) Believe me, during Raaz 3, I saw boys panting in fear after coming out of the theatre. If we gave them more than that, they would have died!
Debdeep: Do you believe in creatures, ghosts and other paranormal phenomena?
Bipasha: No, I don’t really believe in creatures, but we rooted our creature in a Hindu myth that’s really old… there is a possibility that the myth of the Brahmarakshas existed at some point. I don’t think they exist right now and if they do, I don’t really want to meet them (laughs). There is a scene in Creature where I take this decision to take on the beast all alone and my friend who was sitting next to me at the screening said: ‘You really are acting!’ (Laughs) The real Bipasha would say: ‘Let me out of here… mujhe bachao!’ It’s fun… films make us a lot of things we are not.
Debdeep: How was it shooting with a green screen as a ‘co-actor’?
Bipasha: We shot on real locations, so there was no green screen. It is a very advanced film… every shot with the creature had to be done thrice over. Initially, we had no idea what the creature would look like… we had a rough sketch, but that was just about it. I was told: ‘This is where it will be… this is the body… this is the tail’. The detailing took 11 months to put together after the shoot. I am very happy I did this film. We make a lot of rubbish films in Bollywood and I have done my share of rubbish films (laughs), but this is something that I feel was very refreshing for me as an actor. I am asked why I did this film and I am like: ‘Why not?’ The genre is fresh and here I am getting to be the lead and not be a supporting prop to a hero. This is a film that can be a date film and even a kids’ film because children love monster films.
Priyanka: Do you like being called India’s ‘Scream Queen?’
Bipasha: Nooooo! In fact, I lost my voice screaming in this film. My voice is the most important thing for me and after dubbing for this film, I lost my voice completely… I didn’t even have a squeak! In a scene towards the end of the film, I have to keep shouting the name Karan (played by Pakistani actor Imran Abbas) so many times that everyone told me that all the Karans of the world would come into the dubbing studio! (Laughs) After that I decided I no longer want to be ‘Scream Queen’. The new one… ‘The Goddess of Fear’ is good… I like it.
Saionee Chakraborty: Who are the creatures you have met in life?
Bipasha: Why would I talk about them and give them print space?! (Laughs)
Saionee: The weirdest creature you have met… maybe without naming him?
Team t2: It could be a ‘her’ also!
Bipasha: No, no, it’s a ‘him’ only. She’s right… she has good sixth sense! (Laughs out loud) Very dirty… not a human being… a creature in the true sense. Only one I have met so far (winks). Not nice, don’t like (smiles).
Saionee: What were your biggest fears when you started out and what are your fears today?
Bipasha: I had a lot of fears when I started out. I was staying with my parents and straight from there, I had gone to New York and Paris and then I came to Mumbai and I had decided that I am not going to come back (to Calcutta). I had to prove it to my parents that I am capable and responsible. I was 17… not a great age when parents would want to believe you. We were pampered… we had a car and many luxuries. I never went into the kitchen earlier and suddenly, I was in Mumbai staying in a truck driver’s colony where I actually slept on a charpoy.
I still have that vision… it’s never going to leave me. There was half a Sintex tank and in that, they would save water whenever water came in and from that collected water, you could only use half to bathe. And there was a fan above my charpoy that had very little speed. Every day, I used to buy a Rs 7 noodle packet and have it for dinner… an orange-coloured vegetable noodle. There was nothing available on that street and I used to feel scared in the night to go out alone. I used to wear jeans and shirts and would get catcalls all the time and there would be like 30-40 men doing that.
I used to be scared though I am a very upfront girl and I don’t take nonsense. I would keep a hammer in my bag!
Then there was Farrokh Chothia (photographer) who took me under his wing. He used to finish his whole day’s shoot and then he would drop me to Kalina. I used to wait till the time he finished because I used to be so scared of travelling alone. I was in a TV show recently where a girl who was voicing the same fear that I had when I was 16-17. I said I kept a hammer. She said it is a great idea because just learning self-defence won’t help. There was a point of time when I started getting a little courage because I realised if I don’t speak for myself, there is nobody who is going to for me. I have noticed that when I have slapped a man, I have collected a crowd in no time and that guy has learnt a lesson then and there and he won’t have the guts to do it again to a girl.
Saionee: And your fears now?
Bipasha: I fear bhoots since childhood and my didi and I would sleep touching butt-to-butt when I was in Calcutta! (Laughs) My point was if the ghost comes from this side, I will see it and if it comes from the other side, she sees it… and we sleep peacefully! As an actor, I travel worldwide, but I can’t sleep alone. I don’t do anything shady (laughs)… I sleep with my hairstylist, Madhuri. Shooting for Creature was very scary. I asked my maid Lokkhi to sleep in my room with me. I told my set people that you guys scared me so much that I had to sleep with Lokkhi. They were like: ‘Oh Lokkhi is so lucky, you should have called one of us!’
Samhita Chakraborty: How do you motivate yourself to go to the gym every day?
Bipasha: I don’t work out in isolation. I go to a gym with people and feed off their energy. I watch uncles, aunties, young guys… women… everybody today is becoming so aware that health is important. Fitness is not only about looking good. It has a bigger purpose in life…health. You have to have a balanced mind and that will only come with some kind of physical activity. Fitness is key for me… health is key. I also want to have a relaxed old age and not depend on anybody… I want to travel the world and use my money well then. So I believe that I am going to be a fit buddhi one day!
Priyanka: You live by the motto ‘Love Yourself’. How important is it to love oneself?
Bipasha: You have to put yourself on number one priority and love yourself. There are times when I forget ‘love yourself’ and I have to be told that you believe in ‘love yourself’, so go back to it. I believe everything else if you put it at a second and a third and a fourth and a fifth priority, you will actually look after those priorities better if you are on number one. If you are not on number one, you will never be balanced because until and unless you are happy, you are not going to be satisfied. It is not selfish. It is actually the smart way to live because at the end of the day, you are born alone and you are going to die alone. There would be people who would cry for you but they are not going to die with you. Their life will still go on.
Saionee: If Bipasha is at number one, who/what is at number two, three....
Bipasha: Second would be mom-dad and third would be my sisters and family. Work would be there at seven… seven is my lucky number. I would choose six more things before that.
Priyanka: What about your current relationship (Harman Baweja)?
Bipasha: Maybe six… or eight, actually! (Laughs) Eight is good… I have done six before… doesn’t work well.
Ratnalekha Mazumdar: There’s a buzz that you are planning a destination wedding…
Bipasha: No, no I am not! I don’t know where this has originated from… my mother will be very upset that I am planning a wedding she has no idea of! Honestly, I don’t know when I am getting married. Till the last day, you will not know that I am getting married because I also won’t know myself! (Laughs) I have all the makings of a runaway bride… the day I get married, I need to be kept under lock and key! (Laughs)
Samhita: Is Harman prepared to do a Richard Gere (in Runaway Bride) and run after you?
Bipasha: I hope! That will be romantic. My idea of romance is a mix of Notting Hill, Runaway Bride, My Best Friend’s Wedding.... But what people want out of me is Hum Aapke Hain Koun..! and Hum Saath-Saath Hain (laughs).
Saionee: Growing up, did you ever have a picture of the man you wanted to marry?
Bipasha: It’s always been Brad Pitt… but he’s married now! I actually tweeted a picture (of the Pitt-Angelina Jolie wedding) and wanted to write ‘My heart is shattered’, but then decided against it because some Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie fans would want to kill me!
Saionee: How has your dressing sense evolved over the years?
Bipasha: I dress according to my taste… I don’t pay much attention to the High Heel Confidentials of the world. I don’t care about them… they can go to hell. I enjoy being a woman and whatever I am comfortable with. You may say: ‘Bipasha has worn a bodycon again!’ I will say: ‘I will wear it all my life because I have a good body’. Is it a crime to wear it? I like to dress up as per occasion and mood. I don’t like these people who keep criticising all the time… go get a life!
In my sense of fashion, I am somewhere very high street. This whole thing of stylists cloning you and putting some international designs on you and making you fashion forward… I don’t understand that at all. It’s better to retain your own personality in your sense of fashion rather than becoming Christmas trees for international designers. Everyone pretty much looks the same nowadays.
Saionee: Do you give Harman style tips?
Bipasha: He takes all my tips. He’s very good… he’s not vain. I hate vain men… it’s good to be well groomed, but there’s something nice about a man who is relaxed and doesn’t care about his hair and clothes all the time. Also, a guy who listens to his woman: ‘Okay, okay, I will change my shirt… I will wear that’. That’s cute about a man.
Priyanka: What do you like him best in?
Bipasha: T-shirts and jeans… he’s quite a fun guy… easy (smiles).
Priyanka: And what does he like you best in?
Bipasha: He likes me in everything! (Laughs) He just likes me all the time… I find that so weird. He has to not like me sometimes, na? But it hasn’t happened yet, which is sweet in a way, but also very weird. Everything is nice? I can’t digest that!
Priyanka: Wait till you get married!
Bipasha: That’s why! Why do you think I am not getting married (winks). I am quite intelligent… why do you think I have prolonged it for the longest time? (Laughs)
Samhita: Haven’t your parents put pressure on you to get married?
Bipasha: My mom? For the last 10 years! Dad, never. My dad has always been confident of us three sisters. He’s always told us: ‘Be yourself and do what you have to do’. At the end of the day when people ask me when I am getting settled, I tell them: ‘I am very well settled, thank god for that!’ Marriage can be very unsettling, in fact… imagine sharing your room with someone and most importantly your bathroom! Doesn’t go down well with me.
Saionee: You won’t be in Calcutta this Durga Puja, but when you are here, what do you do?
Bipasha: I eat and then I sleep and when I open my eyes, food is ready. I eat and go back to sleep and wake up to eat again! (Laughs) I do my anjali on Ashtami. I go out for half-an-hour to my pandal in Ekdalia and the road is blocked for me so that I can sit there! Once the arati is done, I have to get back in, otherwise there is too much of a ruckus. So I am bored… so I just eat and sleep!